Urban Update December 2017

ISSN 2349-6266 RNI No DELENG/2014/57384

Setting The Agenda For Tomorrow’s Cities

UrbanUpdate Volume IV, Issue VIII

DECEMBER 2017

Rs 100

Leaderspeak

Takeaways from Bonn

CITIES CLIMATE CHANGE

& THE CRISIS

From cities as big as New Delhi to small ones like Gopalpur in Odisha and everywhere in between, citizens are affected by the historical rise in population, pollution and climate changeinduced disasters. All these issues are converging in cities and posing a threat to urban dwellers especially to the underprivileged

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Energy Efficiency

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Seminars

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Sustainable Development Goals

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Swachh Bharat Mission

ECBC

Smart City Mission Capacity Building

Skill Development

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The project is funded by the European Union.

The project is implemented by the AIILSG.

The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of the European Commission.

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December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

EDITORIAL

Citizens & Climate Change

I

ndia witnessed sales of a mindboggling 48,000 two-wheelers each day in 2017 thus becoming the world’s largest producer overtaking China. Rapid urbanisation, inadequate public transport infrastructure, attractive financing options and growth of non-urban markets, among others helped drive up sales. Further, in 2016-17, India’s annual car sales crossed the 3 million mark for the first time. Such sharp increase in private gasoline and diesel driven vehicles has brought with it the deadly problem of ambient air quality in our cities. Recognizing the magnitude of this hazard and its potential for damage, the authorities have put in place several measures. Among them is the proposed migration to Bharat Stage VI emission norms by April 2020 from the current Bharat Stage IV, bypassing Stage V. Stage VI roll out could even be advanced in Delhi and the NCR, looking at the crisis like air quality in the national capital. In addition to technology upgrades by vehicle manufacturers, it calls for fuel quality improvements. Other measures include a big thrust to electric mobility.

Cities in many parts of the world are battling with air quality problems and the larger issue of Climate Change and its adverse effects. World leaders met at the COP 23 in Bonn in November in the backdrop of the pull-out by the USA from the Paris Agreement. While there was apprehension about possible lack of leadership, many countries and even many states in the USA pledged support for the Paris Agreement.

We believe that Climate Change and its ill effects are already upon us. It is no more a potential threat in the future. For example constant sea level rise is there to see and measure, threatening the very existence of many small island nations. While substantial debate, dialogue and deliberation are happening at the topmost levels of nations and in multilateral fora, progress could be slow and sporadic without very substantial, deep and sustained involvement of the common citizen. Ensuring this is easier said than done; at the same time it is crucial in

combating this global scourge and thus calls for all-out effort. There is need to ensure peoples’ participation in mitigating climate change. It is necessary to create more awareness, engage the common man and make him a partner in this battle.

Governments have a role in promoting and mandating carbon reduction programmes mainly for big business and the public sector.

But to the common man on the street, global warming is a rather abstract idea to conceive, much harder to measure. Often it is not within his realm to link the heavy precipitation, flash floods, droughts and landslides to climate change; far less to link his lifestyle to such events. It is difficult for the citizen to see how her habits related to water use, waste disposal, vehicle use, choice of products she buys, etc. affect the environment and can cause degradation.

There is urgent need for awareness building on how our day to day living habits affect the environment. And how we can help - for example, water conservation, energy saving, reuse and recycling, shunning plastic and use of sustainable transport. Urban local bodies can play a very substantial role in building awareness in all these areas and thus promote responsible choices by citizens which can go a long way in mitigating climate change. We may have little choice given that this is the only planet we have, at least for now.

This issue of Urban Update takes a look at Climate Change and its impact on our cities. We carry a detailed coverage on Air Pollution in Delhi, a couple of articles on the proceedings at COP23 in Bonn, Germany and an article on changing urban ecosystem.

We welcome all our readers to write to us on the feasible solutions to tackle climate change related issues that could be beneficial for our cities.

Rajiv Agarwal Editor-In-Chief dg@aiilsg.org

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

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Quotes

PIN POINT BUZZ

PPPs are crucial contributors to the development of countries in the Asia and Pacific region, but an enabling environment is required for these projects to succeed

E-waste is the fastest growing category of waste in the world.

The moment it is dismantled, it has hazardous effect on health as it contains harmful chemicals and heavy metal.

Takehiko Nakao ADB President

Divya Tiwari CEO, Saahas

Swachh Bharat Urban @SwachhBharatGov

Bruhat #Bengaluru MahanagarPalike (BBMP) has focused on improving Source Segregation through the “2-in1-bag” scheme and through individual and decentralized composting

Erel Rosenberg @ErelRosenberg Retail Analytics

It is very important for planners to understand the capacity of any city to hold the population, suitability for urban activities, geographical location, proximity to different hazards, present vulnerability and future risks to develop smart cities

Urban Transitions @NCEcities

This challenge (Smart Cities) — the first of its kind in Canada — will encourage communities to innovate and take risks to improve people’s lives... The Smart Cities Challenge will help bring them to life, and find solutions that achieve real and positive outcomes for Canada’s middle class Amarjeet Sohi, Minister of Infrastructure and Communities

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December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

The future of smart cities requires open technology, and we encouraged the government to make openness a key piece of the Smart City Challenge.

Open technology will ensure that cities are able to use the most innovative technologies and ensure that any future innovation will work with their investments today Kurtis McBride CEO and co-founder of Miovision

Urban trees can transform city neighborhoods, contributing to a wide range of public health gains

Vice President of India @VPSecretariat

Rapid urbanization, burgeoning urban population, unplanned and haphazard growth of urban areas, inability of civic bodies to cope with increasing demand in services, lack of adequate financial resources and functional powers are major problems faced by corporations

Inside

Volume 4, Issue 8

Article

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34

38

A few weeks ago several Indian states were to suffer yet again from nature’s fury while others braced for its coming impact. Cyclone Ockhi, after devastating the coasts of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and the Lakshadweep islands, moved towards Maharashtra and Gujarat once again highlighting the deadly natural disasters caused by climate change

Cities need to invest in living infrastructures to be climate resilient Climate resilience of cities across the world has come in for a fresh review. At Bonn, a lot of innovative ways were at display to make cities climate resilient

Breathing to Death Air pollution causes thirty percent premature deaths in India. The situation is getiing worse by the day. While people are choking to death, in place of an urgent solution what we get is blame game

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Cover Story

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RegularS Pin Point Equi-City Newscan

41 Cities, Climate Change & The Crisis

From cities as big as New Delhi to small ones like Gopalpur in Odisha and everywhere in between, citizens are affected by the historical rise in population, pollution and climate change-induced disasters. All these issues are converging in cities and posing a threat to urban dwellers especially to the underprivileged

Numerographs

The Cultural Capital of Karnataka Mysuru is aptly called cultural capital of Karnataka. The Dussehra festivities attract tourists fron not only India but from across the globe. Life is a leisure in the city and it’s called pensioner’s paradise. The sheer beauty of the town, its culture, history and heritage structures mesmerise you. It’s a life time experience to visit the city and enjoy its calmness, beauty and vitality

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December 2017

Funding The Fight Against Climate Change

VELO-CITY

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Inside

City Images Book Review Urban Agenda

Combating Climate Change Climate Change has emerged as one of the biggest challenges to life on earth. From rising sea level to pollution in cities across the globe, it has caused immense consternation. While world debates look for a solution, here are some startling figures that underline the gravity of the situation and crying need to battle it urgently

LEADerspeak

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Takeaways from Bonn The recently concluded 23rd edition of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Bonn was termed a damp squib by many environmentalists as there was no clear-cut outcome on discussions related to the issues of finance, loss and damage, and ‘pre-2020 actions’. Even the clause of finance and technology transfer was added in the last minute after developing countries raised the issue of no mention of the same. One of the main outcomes of the conference was the Talanoa Dialogue

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

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feature | Equi-City

ICT & its importance for Local Governance Equi-City Team

I

n present era of technological development, Information and communication technologies (ICTs) and related telecommunication and other digital networks are considered to be a major driving force of building information societies and economies and are increasingly recognized as a new factor in improving existing local governance practices.

Policy Thrust in Capacity Building at local government level

There is need to have a policy that governs ICTs and regulatory mechanism to monitor and manage operations in the ICTs sector. Some of the components to form a firm foundation for ICTs include: Assessment of ICT status in all sectors of the society (e-readiness), the challenges encountered in the establishment of an e-society, and above all the will and commitment by leaders to adopt ICTs as enablers for national economic development.

1. Provide equal access to ICT enabled education and training in all parts of the city, including the disadvantaged communities.

2. Facilitate acquisition of basic, applicable and affordable ICTequipment.

3. Build ICT capacity skills.

4. Promote stakeholder participation and partnership.

5. Promote training in software development, provision of ICT service and ICT resource development.

6. Promote e-learning and use of e-learning materials.

7. Standardise the use of ICT in education sector for present generation to adopt new technology

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December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

and be used to it.

8. Embed ICT literacy in pedagogy of our schools, colleges and universities.

Highlights from the Workshop Session 1: ICT and its Importance for Nagpur Municipal Officials This session was taken by Suryakant Dhoke, Sr Technical Manager, National Informatics Center (NIC). The session started with “What is ICT?And it’s importance for local governance”. Focus was given on integration of hardware, software and technology along with cloud computing and communication technology. Discussions were held on digitization and ICT as a part and parcel of today’s Governance system.

According to the Speaker these services provide all the information for a particular topic or to particular person regarding works of the Municipal Corporation. On the other hand, the Expert discussed the use of ICT in field of Grievance redressal and Complaint handling mechanism of the Municipal Corporation.

Functions of ICT were also explained with details related to payment and E-Services. The Speaker talked about Virus Free Computers and systems when dealing with payments, Mobile App, and Data centre. The session also focused on Digital Locker, and initiatives by Government of India.

banking systems with respect to Indian Economy. The best practice for Cashless economy in village Harisal, Amaravati was discussed in detail during the session. The advantages of the system such as to avoid time consumption, to reduce risk and security of the money involved were discussed during the session. Many methods of cashless transactions were explained such as Debit cards and AEPS and mobile banking.For the safety and security of the people, topics such as ATM fraud, Card skimming and fake ATMs were also focussed upon. The Session also focused on the overall technological advancements in online payments like UPI and Mobile banking.

Four major principles for a better and managed government were also discussed during the session: ♦♦ Government Services should be citizen-focused. People do not need to know how government is organised or who does what.

Services need to be offered in ways that make sense to the customer. ♦♦ Government Services should be accessible. All services which can be delivered electronically should be done, whether over the Internet, through mobile phones, digital TV, call centres, or personal computers – customer demand will determine the mix. ♦♦ Government Services should be

Session 2: Cashless Economy

This workshop was conducted by Shri.

Ashish Ratnaparkhi, Chief Manager, Maharashtra Bank. The session started with the vision and mission for Cashless Economy. The Speaker focused on the IT-based banking system and Core

NMC Officials and Equi-City team at the Inaugural of the workshop

inclusive. New services must be developed so that they are available to all and easy to use. ♦♦ Managing Information. Information policies must be adopted which are coherent and compatible so that the best use is made of Government’s valuable knowledge and information resources.

Adopting the ICT Strategy at local government level

Each local authority should have its own implementing and strategic plan.

ICT Statement is a broad framework strategy with key milestones.

It is clear that e-Government, rather than being the sole responsibility of IT department at a local authority, must be a joint collaborative effort between all relevant departments, including Finance and IT, in order to ensure successful implementation of e-Government strategies.

The Route Map

The route map covers: ♦♦ Leadership and Commitment Municipal Corporation to adopt a corporate approach to the e-revolution, based on what citizens want, and work across departments and in co-operation with local partners. They will maximise access to services through different channels, set explicit service standards, and be clear on how they manage

relationships between them. ♦♦ Actions

Development of Access Channels

Municipal Corporations should understand the different channels by which people access their services (now and in the future), agree service standards with users, and develop a strategy for managing these channels and their integration with each other and linking with back office processes.

The technology and organisational change required will flow from this.

♦♦

♦♦

Achieving Back Office Integration

Initially authorities will develop front end processes such as one stop shops, separately from integrated e-enabled back office functions. These changes will then be driven by Best Value, including strategic partnering, the development of shared community strategies and joint service provision, for example, between health and social services. ♦♦ A Change of Culture to Innovation, Learning and Sharing Expertise.

Back office for ICT based activities includes the following criteria: 1. Information (about a service).

2. Transaction (applying/ordering/ paying or voting).

3. Supply (from support service/ supplier/contractor etc.).

4. Delivery (to user/member of public).

♦♦

♦♦

Benefits of ICT based LocalGovernment:

There are several benefits that e-governance implementation provides: ♦♦ E-government helps improve efficiency in government procedures.

ICTs are a necessary enabler of reforms to the ways in which public administrations work. Improving internal operating systems – financial systems, purchasing and payment arrangements, internal communications and sharing of information – and programme processing and delivery arrangements can generate

♦♦

operating efficiencies and improve performance.

The use of ICT to generate improvements and efficiency in services has been a primary driver in e-government activity. In particular, the use of the Internet has given a major boost to customer focused, seamless services, which aims to transcend the structure of public administrations. Online services are increasingly seen as part of broader service strategy, with focus on customer and efficiency benefits.

ICT can support more effective outcomes in key policy areas such as health, welfare services, security and education. Ultimately, governments and public administrations exist to deliver policy outcomes, and ICT are a major enabler across all major policy areas.

Better governance arrangements in themselves will promote economic policy objectives. More specific effects may range from impacts on ICT production, ecommerce diffusion and business productivity to indirect effects such as reduced fiscal requirements owing to more effective programmes and efficiencies flowing through to the broader economy.

E-governance can help forward the reform agenda. When aligned with modernization goals, implementing e-governance can help administrations focus on the additional changes needed to meet service delivery and good governance concerns. At the same time, it provides some valuable reform tools and builds support from the government employees for achieving these objectives.

Through citizen engagement, e-governance can improve the overall trust relationship between government and public administration. These objectives may involve connection between efficiency and effectiveness, efficiency and openness, accountability and customer focus.

Therefore for this, priorities need to be set.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

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NEWScan

Delhi signs twin city agreement with Seoul Seoul Mayor Park Won Soon suggested a slew of measures for Delhi to emulate for tackling transport and pollution related issues at a recent event organised at the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library Team UrbanUpdate

Delhi: Delhi government has approved the agreement on the establishment of Friendship City Relationship between Delhi and the Seoul Metropolitan Government.

A delegation of the Seoul Metropolitan Government led by Mayor Park Won Soon, met Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal recently at the Delhi Secretariat.Kejriwal said, ‘I am so happy to meet Park Won Soon after 11 years. We both met in 2006 in Manila when wereceived the Ramon Magsaysay Award. We are very much interested in having atwin city agreement to establish friendship and cooperation’.

The agreement now has to be approved by the Union Government.

Once approved by the Union Govern-

ment the agreement will come into effect. The areas ofcooperation covered are environment, culture and tourism, transportation,education, waste water and solid waste management, public health, youthexchange, infrastructure, etc.The delegation of Seoul made a presentation on how from time to time theyhave developed on different fronts through the years in different sectorsfrom transport, water management, solid waste management, etc.

The Chief Minister lauded the presentation and said many of the fieldspresented are a challenge for the government of Delhi also. “We lookforward to learn from Seoul through this agreement,” the Chief Minister said. The Mayor of Seoul also invited the Chief Minister to visit Seoul with a delegation from Delhi and see for himself the work done.

World Resource Institute organised a seminar ‘Seoul-Delhi Dialogue: Towards a Sustainable City’ at Nehru Memorial Museum. Seoul Mayor Park Won Soon said that they are happy to share the approach and learnings with the Indian government. The key is collaborated efforts, thinking about what the people need. He added that the power lies with citizens. He explained that despite political differences with the other tiers of governments how he managed to transform Seoul city during his term. He also gave credit to his

predecessors for the excellent works initiated at local level.

Durga Shankar Mishra, Secretary Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs; OP Agarwal, CEO, WRI India; Manish Bapna, Managing Director, World Resources Institute; and several other urbanists and academicians were present at the seminar.

The South Korean team spoke mainly about water, waste and traffic management in the city. They shared the journey of Seoul city from the ruins in 1950 to a buzzing city today. The Seoul team compared the strength of bus transport in the city. Seoul with an area of 605 sq km has over 7000 buses plying on the roads while Delhi having larger area of around 1400 sq km has just 3900 buses.

They highlighted the need for an apex decision-making body and explained how city administration collaborated with other groups such as private bodies and think tanks. As many as 66% people in Seoul use the metro and bus system, the waste disposal mechanism has been decentralised and a large landfill has been transformed into an urban public space. Also, existing highways have been torn down for better traffic management and an Urban Planning Charter with inputs from citizens has been put in place for the next 100 years to improve quality of life – these are some examples of city planning from Seoul that Indian cities can emulate.

Seoul Mayor, Park Won Soon addressing a seminar on “Seoul Delhi Dialogue: Towards Sustainable City” at Nehru Memorial Museum , New Delhi

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December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

NEWSCAN

UP cities elect new Mayors Lucknow: Bharatiya Janata Party emerged as the clear winner in the Uttar Pradesh civil polls held in the month of November. The party won fourteen out of sixteen mayor posts across the state. The polls were seen as a big test for the incumbent Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath after coming to power eight months ago. The elections were held in three phases and the voter turnout was about fifty three percent. Over 3.36 crores voters exercised their franchise and decided the fate of over seventy nine thousand candidates. The Chief Minister himself led the BJP campaign as his performance was closely watched after massive win in UP assembly polls earlier this year.

Apart from winning fourteen mayor posts, the party also won the most municipal council seats. It won seventy out of hundred and ninety seats at stake. On the nagar panchayats BJP won hundred seats out of four ninety eight. But the biggest winners were independent candidates. As many as 182 independent candidates won but that is not surprising as in UP they have traditionally scored better than party backed candidates.

Other parties in the fray trailed behind. So far as mayoral elections are concerned, BahujanSamaj Party won two mayor posts but SamajwadiParty was next to BJP in the Municipal Council and nagar panchayats. In 2012 BJP had won ten out of twelve City Agra Aligarh Allahabad Ayodhya Bareilly Firozabad Ghaziabad Gorakhpur Jhansi Kanpur Lucknow Mathura Meerut Moradabad Saharanpur Varanasi

Mayors Naveen Jain Mohammad Furqan Abhilasha Gupta Rishikesh Upadhayay Umesh Gautam Nutan Rathore Asha Sharma Sitaram Jaiswal Ramteerth Singhal Pramila Pandey Sanyukta Bhatia Manisha Gupta Sunita Verma Vinod Agarwal Sanjeev Walia Mridula Jaiswal

Sanyukta Bhatia, the newly elected mayor of Lucknow, with supporters after the announcement of the results of UP civic polls

Mayor posts, the other two had gone to independent candidates backed

by BSP and SP. This time four new municipalities of Ayodhya, Saharanpur, Firozabad and Mathura were created and BJP won all four of them. BJP’s victory in the civic polls did not come as a surprise. The party has traditionally done well in civic polls. This time the entire party machinery worked tirelessly to drive home the point that the government has performed in the last eight months. But surprising was the performance of BSP which finished second despite its low key campaign and the fact the way it was routed in previous Lok Sabha and state elections.

BSP managed to dislodge BJP in Aligarh and Meerut from the post of Mayor.

Aligarh was a big surprise as BJP never lost that seat since 1995 when direct voting was introduced for Mayor’s post.

Breaking the Glass Ceiling

The city of Nawabs elected its first woman mayor in hundred years. The mayoral seat this time was reserved for women. The city got a chance to elect

a woman mayor hundred years after Uttar Pradesh Municipalities Act came into existence. BJP’s Sanyukta Bhatia won the post of Mayor in Lucknow.

After taking oath Sanyukta Bhatia said that her top most priority will be to improve the cleanliness ranking of the state capital. She added that she would seek support from the state government to develop the city. More importantly she said that she would seek more teeth for the civic body and ensure that the 74thAmendment of the Constitution is implemented in letter and spirit.

Beyond politics work at local level is required

Time of accusations and counter accusation is over. What is required is delivery at the ground level by the newly elected local bodies. The fiscal health of these corporations is in dire straits. While the state government will have to support them in the short run, local bodies will have to find ways to meet expenses and improve civic infrastructure in their areas which is in crying need.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

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BRIEFS

NEWSCAN

Chennai becomes UNESCO ‘Creative City’

Khan Market, world’s 24th costliest retail hotspot

Chennai, The capital city of Tamil Nadu has been included in UNESCO’s Creative Cities Network for its rich musical tradition.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, congratulating the citizens of Chennai tweeted, “Chennai’s contribution to our rich culture is precious.

This is a proud moment for India.”A total of 64 cities from 44 countries have been selected in the UNESCO Creative Cities Network. “They join a network at the frontline of UNESCO’s efforts to foster innovation and creativity as key drivers for a more sustainable and inclusive urban development,” it stated.

Gastronomy, music, crafts and folk art, media arts, design, film and literature are the seven fields of creativity highlighted by the network, which now has a total of 180 cities in 72 countries.

New Delhi: Delhi’s Khan Market is the most expensive retail location in India and has secured the 24th position in global rankings. According to the Cushman and Wakefield report, with the upscale of Khan Market, it continues to be the costliest place to hire a shop in India.

Despite monthly rentals being stable at Khan Market at Rs 1250 per sq ft in the past one year, its ranking improved.

In the 2016 report, it was placed 28th.

“Khan Market has emerged as the most expensive retail location in India and has clinched the 24th position in global rankings,” the consultant said. The rise of Khan Market in the global rankings since 2016 is because of a drop in rentals in some key global markets, it added.

Under a survey, 400 retail locations globally were considered across 66 countries for the annual survey. New York’s Upper 5th Avenue retained its numerouno position while Hong Kong’s Causeway Bay and London’s Bond Street were ranked second and third, respectively. In the Asia-Pacific region, Khan Market came at the 11th position while Gurgaon’s DLF Galleria and Mumbai’s Linking Road secured 19th and 20th positions.

“The retail sector in India has remained

Bengaluru gets its first roadside e-waste bin For the first time in Bengaluru, a public e waste bin has been installed along roadside on CMH road to collect e waste prom public. The bin has been put up jointly by NGO Saahas and Environmental Synergies in Development (Ensyde), NGO, and BM Kaval Residents’ Welfare Association, will collect discarded electrical or electronic devices. The IT hub of India, Bengaluru generates 37,000 metric tonnes of e waste every year. Manvel Alur, CEO, Ensyde, said the company has collected 4.4 tonnes of e-waste in 10 months. “We have recovered 306kg of metals and diverted 26.34kg of toxic metals from landfills. The e-waste collected is given to a recycler for further processing,” she said.

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December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

cautious in activities even though there was a visible momentum in leasing across main streets as well as shopping centres.

Leasing activities across most key micromarkets were led by food and beverages and fashion and lifestyle brands,” said Anshul Jain, Country Head and MDIndia, Cushman and Wakefield.

“These micro-markets have been commanding high rentals as these are established retail destinations due to factors like their geographic locations allowing access to larger catchment for the retailers,” the consultant added.

“Connaught Place, which had slipped from its previous superior retail destination status, saw renewed interest from retailers across categories. The location has gone through a reinvention in the last few years, with the metro construction being completed and making it easily accessible from across the city,” the consultant said.

Railway coaches to have bio-toilets by 2018 New Delhi: The Ministry of Railways has advanced the target for 100 percent completion of installing Bio-toilets in coaches to December 2018.

The decision was announced at an event titled, “Indian Transport Sector: Marching towards sustainable mobility” at Conference of Parties (COP-23), Indian Pavilion at Bonn, Germany. Ravindra Gupta, Member (Rolling Stock), Ministry of Railways mentioned that the ministry is working on various innovative steps towards attaining a low carbon pathway and to provide sustainable mobility.

Gupta emphasized particularly on the innovative steps taken by Indian Railways by way of bio-toilets for having an open discharge free environment in line with mission of “Swachh Bharat” and Open Defecation Free (ODF) campaign of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. In line with mission of Swachh Bharat and Open Defecation Free (ODF) campaigns, bio-toilets were introduced to curb the unhygienic practice, and at present, more than 900 trains have been augmented with bio-toilets in either all or some coaches of the trains. The event started with an Audio-Visual film on Indian Railways showcasing key low carbon transport initiatives being taken by Indian Railways such as Electrification, Energy Efficiency initiatives and renewable energy deployment. The session was organised in partnership with the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW) and The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), as knowledge partners, FICCI as industry partner, and RITES as technical partner.

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Taloja industries to set up animal hospital After a stray dog turned blue due to release of chemicals by an industrial unit in Taloja, Navi Mumbai, the MIDC Taloja Industries Association (TIA) has decided to start a hospital for stray animals. TIA president Satish Shetty said, “It was an unfortunate incident when the stray dog turned blue. The industrial unit was criticised, and many even demanded that it be shifted. However, this is not practical. Thus, we have proposed an initiative called Shelter for Strays, and have even identified the location for the facility. The animal hospital will be a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiative of the association, and will be developed by Myvets Charitable Trust & Research Centre. Funds of 80 lakh have been sanctioned for its development.”

BMC to come up with new policy on dilapidated buildings To declare any building dilapidated, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has come up with a policy which will be based on guidelines provided by Bombay High Court on vacating a dilapidated building.

The policy consists of provisions which make structural audits mandatory for a building before declaring it dilapidated and for prosecution of the owner for not carrying out structural audit even after a notice is issued by the BMC. “The policy will protect the rights of tenants, and it will do away with the practice of arbitrary declaration of dilapidated building,” said a senior official from the civic body’s Building Proposal department.

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NEWSCAN

Maharashtra to connect farmlands with solar power Ahmednagar: To provide the state’s farmlands 12 hours uninterrupted power by tapping solar energy, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis laid the foundation stone for a pilot project at Ralegan-Siddhi, the famed model village created by social crusader Anna Hazare, under the state government’s ‘Mukhyamantri Agricultural Solar Feeder Scheme’. “With this Agricultural Solar Feeder Scheme, we will be able to provide electricity to our farmers during daytime.

This is a clean and green energy, is environment friendly and I am confident that in three years it will change the entire scenario of the agricultural sector.

The scheme has earned laurels from the NITI Aayog, which has asked other states to emulate it” Fadnavis said.

The Central government will allocate Rs 3 crore per plant enabling the state to generate solar power at a cheaper rate and lead to massive savings over the next 10 years or so, especially since

installation and price per unit of solar power have reduced in recent times, said officials.

“If we want to save the state from pollution, then everyone should make maximum use of solar energy. Soon we will have to generate electricity from waste, which in turn will add to cleanliness, so ‘Waste is Best’,” Hazare said on the occasion.

State Water Resources Minister Ram Shinde, who is also Ahmednagar’s Guardian Minister said “Solar energy will enhance livelihood of people of the region and Ralegan-Siddhi was the ideal choice for setting up the state’s first solar agricultural feeder projects.”

Northeast to get India’s first ‘Air Dispensary’ Imphal: Northeast is all set to get India’s first-ever “Air Dispensary” based in a helicopter and the Union Ministry of Development of Northeast (DONER) has already contributed Rs 25 crore as part of the initial funding for this initiative.

Disclosing this after a meeting with the representatives of Aviation Sector and helicopter service/Pawan Hans, Union Minister of State for Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), Dr Jitendra Singh said, for quite a few months, the DoNER Ministry had been exploring the idea of introducing a helicopter based Dispensary/ OPD service in such far flung and remote areas, where no doctor or medical facility was available and the patient, in need, also did not have any access to any medical care. The proposal put forward by the Ministry of DoNER, he said, has been accepted and is in the final stages of process in the Union Ministry of Civil Aviation. The Union Ministry of Northeast/DoNER, Dr Singh said, is keenly pursuing the proposal so that by the beginning of 2018. As per the envisaged plan, Dr Singh said, to begin with, helicopter will be based at two locations, namely Imphal in Manipur and Shillong in Meghalaya. Both of these cities have premier postgraduate medical institutes from where specialist doctors, along with the necessary equipment and paramedical staff, would be able to move into the helicopter and hold a dispensary/OPD in different locations across the eight States of North Eastern Region. On its way back, he said, the same helicopter can also transport a sick patient, requiring admission, to a city hospital. Giving an account of other new helicopter service plans for Northeast, Dr Jitendra Singh said, three twin-engine helicopters are planned to be placed for initial operation on six routes in the region around Imphal, Guwahati and Dibrugarh.

CITY IMAGES

Hong Kong

Ready for Celebration

Like humans, cities too deck up for festivities. Christmas is round the corner and the Hong Kong unveiled two spectacular light shows over its Victoria Harbour – the new version of the internationally acclaimed nightly multi-media light show A Symphony of Light and the winter version of the Hong Kong Pulse Light Show.

The two outstanding shows, best viewed from the Tsim Sha Tsui

waterfront, will brighten up Hong Kong’s Christmas with dynamic lighting effects and the illusion of an icy atmosphere at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre.

The new version of A Symphony of Lights features dynamic rays of light sent out in rhythm from 40 buildings and locations on both sides of the Victoria Harbour.

The new show incorporates a variety

of exciting lighting effects such as coloured searchlights, lasers, and allnew beam lights sent out like a special fan-shaped lighting effect from the roof of the Central Government Offices and the Revenue Tower.

Ten LED panels on a number of harbourside buildings are for the first time joining the multi-media show, displaying images and messages to encourage audience participation.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

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World’s first off shore desalination unit Chennai is all set to have the world’s first offshore desalination plant for which a deep sea site has been finalised which is 40 km from the Ennore coast. The Union government is likely to consider the project which has already been submitted by the National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT). The Deep Sea Mission will be launched in March 2018. M Rajeevan Nair, secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences said, “NIOT had finalised the design and submitted the DPR. It would be a 10-MLD capacity plant costing an estimated `2,000 crore. Since Chennai has shallow waters, we have to travel 40 km into the sea to get enough depth to take in deep sea cold water needed for the process. It is a great challenge for ocean engineers.”

Village Development Board to develop urban, rural Delhi villages Rural Development Board to be replaced by newly-formed Village Development Board to ensure both the urban and rural villages in the capital city.

Rural Development Minister Gopal Rai said the decision was approved in a Cabinet meeting and the Board had been allotted Rs 600 crore. Rai will be the chairman of the board and all MLAs and MPs will be its members. Gopal Rai said the DVDB would subsume the Delhi Rural Development Board (DRDB), meant for carrying out development works only in villages, adding that all 300 villages in the national capital will come under the purview of the board. The minister said the move was aimed at developing villages in urban areas.

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NEWSCAN

MMB to have jetties at Borivali Mumbai: The Maharashtra Maritime Board (MMB) has floated Expression of Interest (EoI) for developing passenger ferry services between NCPA at Nariman Point and Borivali. Earlier there were plans for developing ferry services with stoppages at locations like Bandra, Versova, Marve, Juhuand in the following phase to link South Mumbai and the western suburbs. However, the rough seas on the western seaboard which affected operations, the proposed coastal road between South Mumbai and Kandivali and the likely low rate of return, led to second thoughts on the already-delayed project. “The MMB is planning to develop the proposed jetties near NCPA at Nariman Point and at Borivali.

Regardless of the fate of the water transport project, these jetties can be used for purposes such as decongesting the anchorage at the Gateway of India and New Ferry Wharf, tourism, cruises, water sports and seaplanes. The jetties can be used for launching ferry services

to other locations, including Goa and the Konkan,” said a senior MMB official.

This will also decrease the MMB’s dependence on the jetties at the Gateway of India and the New Ferry Wharf, which are under the control of the Mumbai Port Trust (MbPT).

“The two jetties can be developed on standalone basis. The NCPA jetty can be used for water transport operations across Maharashtra’s coastline while the jetty at Borivali, the site for which is located in the creek, can be used across the year due to the sheltered waters which makes it ideal for tourism purposes… the process is underway and instructions have been given to examine the viability,” he added.

The potential of the water-transport sector in Mumbai and on Maharashtra’s 720km coastline remains under-utilized.

Conceptualizedalmost a decade ago, the west coast water transport project has been overtaken by subsequent infrastructure addition plans including the coastal road.

Bicycle points at all metro stations Hyderabad: The Hyderabad Metro Rail (HMR) will be setting up bicycle stations at all metro stations in the city. As the HMR officials said the move will encourage people to use environment friendly non-motorized transport and help keep pollution levels in the city under check. Amidst the rising pollution levels in all the cities across the country, the move was welcomed by the people of Hyderabad. The Metro rail officials are planning to set up 400 bike stations with 10,000 bicycles in a phased manner over the next few years.

In 2016, HMR entered into a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Hyderabad Bicycling Club (HBC) and UN Habitat to provide last mile connectivity where it proposed the construction of 400 bike stations for the city. Out of the 400 proposed bike stations, 63 will be at Metro stations and the rest at feeder stations nearby. HBC chairman DV Manohar said, “To begin with, bicycle stations will be set up at Miyapur, JNTU and Kukatpally Metro stations. Half a dozen feeder stations with 75 cycles will be set up in nearby localities. Another 225 bicycles, which are being procured from Germany, are in transit.” He further explained that people can use the feeder stations near their homes and offices to rent a bicycle and drop it off at a bike station near the Metro. However, the rent has still not been decided by authorities. The HMR has also decided to launch a mobile app or smart card to facilitate payment for both Metro tickets and bicycle rent. For protection from theft and damage, the bicycles will be equipped with state-of-theart technology with GPS as protection. The HMR’s move is not the first in the city. Bhopal and Mysuru already have the bike sharing system, in Bhopal, the bike sharing system was set up under Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode with 500 bicycles at 50 stations while Mysuru witnessed the launch of the project in June.

NEWSCAN

Smart City Expo World Congress hosts event on Smart Cities and Urban Solutions

“Never before in history has there been so much talent and creativity concentrated in so little space. It is our responsibility to seize this opportunity and use all the means to grasp the full potential of these urban powerhouses and that’s what Smart City Expo World Congress will be focusing on this edition.”

Ugo Valenti, Event’s director Barcelona: Smart City Expo World Congress, the leading international event on smart cities hosted its biggest edition to date under the theme of Empower Cities, Empower People, and Smart City Expo World Congress (SCEWC). 700 cities worldwide as well as 675 exhibitors and 420 speakers, all of them record-breaking figures participated in the summit. The cities who had representatives in Barcelona are Atlanta, Berlin, Busan, Casablanca, Dubai, Grenoble, London, Lyon, Montevideo, Moscow, New York City, Puebla, Québec, Taipei, Tel Aviv and Zhejiang. While the event also hosted several country pavilions such as those of Australia, Austria, Belgium, Chile, China, Denmark, Dubai, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Holland, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Norway, Sweden and USA. The event focused on strategies to empower metropolises and their citizens through active participation, critical reflection, awareness and access and control over important decisions and resources. The event included the first Smart Mobility World Congress, a summit resulting from the merger of Bcn Rail, international railway industry show, and the SCEWC’s own mobility

track. In recent years, the concept of smart cities has been widespread across the globe raising awareness about the need to transform cities and through them the world. Many have agreed that urban transformation would be impossible without digital technologies and more precisely ICT and IoT are the backbone of the cities of the future.

The event’s director, Ugo Valenti, said, We believe that the role that citizens will play in the near future will be crucial. Top-down governance approaches are gone for good and we need to shift the relation between city governments and residents taking it one step further. Never before in history has there been so much talent and creativity concentrated in so little space. It is our responsibility to seize this opportunity and use all the means to grasp the full potential of these urban powerhouses and that’s what Smart City Expo World Congress will be focusing on this edition.

A total of 420 international experts shared their insights about how the urban future should address its most pressing challenges. They delved into the future of urban settlements through a conference program structured in

8 themes: Government, Safe cities, Economy, Sustainability, Circular, Society and Data Technology.

Among the eminent speakers featured Robert Muggah, a political scientist specialized in the crossroads between cities, security and technology; Joan Clos, Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) and former Mayor of Barcelona; Bettina Warburg, blockchain researcher, entrepreneur and educator who works with Governments and members of the Fortune 500 list to drive the deployment of block chain technology; Dimitri Zenghelis, one of the leading experts in climate change economics, Senior Visiting Fellow at the Grantham Research Institute at the London School of Economics; and Beth Simone Noveck, director of the Governance Lab and member of the first Technology Secretariat and head of the White House Open Government Initiative.

Mobility is one of the concerns every city need to address. The safe and easy movement within a city and from one metropolis to another has indeed become one of the cornerstones of smart cities.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

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NEWSCAN

GWMC to take all the ongoing garbage projects

23 stations at Delhi metro to get Police booths

Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar said that all the ongoing garbage management projects in the state will be transferred to the Goa Waste Management Corporation. The funding provided to panchayats to handle waste will also be hiked. Panchayats near the five major towns, the coastal belt, the tourism belt and the airport will get higher funding, he said. “Goa State Infrastructure Development Corporation used to handle the plants at Saligao and Cacora and common biomedical waste treatment facility at Kundaim. The cabinet has approved the transfer of all those projects lock, stock, barrel, and the handling contracts to Goa Waste Management Corporation,” the chief minister said. Parrikar said that for wastes like e-waste, bio-medical waste and hazardous waste, there are different regulations for the management of each of them, and since panchayats do not have the expertise to handle these wastes, the corporation will deal with it.

New Delhi: Commuters of Delhi metro will now, not have to go to police stations to file FIR against harassment, theft or stalking. The Delhi police has issued an order according to which its staff would be present at the booths at 23 metro stations. The staff will help commuters in filing complaints. The order requires police personnel to be present at the booths between 9am to 5pm.

As of now, crimes in Delhi Metro are dealt by the Metro wing of Delhi Police.

The Delhi Metro with 134 stations has 10 police stations and a total strength of 220 personnel. These police stations are at the most busy stations like Shastri Park, Kashmere Gate, Rithala, Rajiv Chowk, Janakpuri, Ghitorni, INA, Nehru Place, Yamuna Bank Depot and Pragati Maidan.

After ensuring the availability of staff, the facility will be extended across all Metro stations. Metro booths will also be provided computers so that e-FIRs can be filed. About 28 lakhs passengers commute in the Delhi Metro every day and this year, till date, about 11,000 cases of crime have been registered out of which 90 per cent are related to theft and pick pocketing, where an e-FIR can be filed.

Pankaj Singh, DCP (Metro) said, “Unlike police stations in the city covering residential area, the jurisdiction of

Panchkula Municipal Corporation to start ‘Night Sweeping Project’ Owing to poor sanitation, especially in colonies and villages, the Panchkula Municipal Corporation has planned to start a night sweeping project.

The Haryana Government has given an approval to hire more safaikaramcharis for the sanitation wing. The project is likely to start next month.

Municipal Commissioner Rajesh Jopgal said they had got an approval to hire more safaikaramcharis and the process will start soon. The sweeping will be done manually.

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a Metro Police Station is spread over a long distance. For instance, the station between Rajiv Chowk and Dwarka Sector 21 Metro station comes under the jurisdiction of Raja Garden Metro Police Station. The average time taken from the police station to reach a Metro station is about half-an-hour. We are trying to reduce inconvenience for passengers.”

With the order, cops will be present at the following metro stations: Shahdara, Dilshad Garden, and Kashmiri Gate, Chandni Chowk, New Delhi, Rohini West, Inderlok, Kirti Nagar, Karol Bagh, Rajiv Chowk, Udyog Bhawan, Central Secretariat, Uttam Nagar East, Tilak Nagar, Dhaula Kuan, Airport, Dwarka Sector 10, Chattarpur, AIIMS, Nehru Place, Karkardooma, PragatiMaidan and ITO.

CPCB declares Varanasi as the most polluted city Varanasi: The Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) in a recent report that monitors air quality in 48 districts across the country declared Varanasi as the worst polluted city in the country. Varanasi has beaten even Delhi with an average air quality index (AQI) of 491 in its suburbs which is regarded as ‘severe’. New Delhi, on the other hand, is at an index of 468. The report states that PM 2.5 was the major air quality deterioration in Varanasi. PM 2.5 is air pollutant with a diameter of 2.5 micrometers or less which is small enough to invade through the smallest air ways.

The officials of Uttar Pradesh Pollution Control Board (UPPCB) said that the dust from construction works in Varanasi was the major cause of pollution. UPPCB’s Varanasi Regional Officer Anil Kumar Singh added that Varanasi has no polluting industry around, and it (pollution) is because most of its roads are dug up and drains are being constructed, so there is heavy civil construction going on. This is the reason of high bad AQI value. “Sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides are all under control,” he added. In 2016 also, Varanasi was in limelight due to severe levels of pollution. Data for August from UPPCB shows that pollution in Varanasi is up by over 10 per cent compared to August last year. Apart from Varanasi, the cities topping the CPCB list were: Gurugram (480), Noida (470), Delhi (468), Bhiwadi (463), Lucknow (462), Kanpur (461), Patna (428), Faridabad (428), Muzaffarpur (409), and Agra (404).

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GHMC plans white topping for water stagnation

Marine Drive to install railings along divider

MUMBAI: The three-member committee appointed by Bombay highcourt has approved beautification of Marine Drive and installation of railings along the divider to discourage pedestrians from jumping across, which leads to serious accidents.

The restoration is a collective effort of the BMC, residents, architect Ratan Batliboi and local BJP corporator Harshita Narvekar.

The committee consists of Mumbai Heritage Conservation Committee (MHCC) chairman Ramanath Jha, municipal commissioner Ajoy Mehta and city police Chief Datta Padsalgikar.

For any work purpose along the Marine Drive, a heritage precinct, one needs the approval of the committee and then the MHCC by mentioning work details.

Some of the prominent projects include removal and resurfacing of defunct pipeline and restoration of a defunct fountain near Princess Street flyover.

Taking note of citizens’ complaints that central divider was being used to cross the road, civic chief also ordered installation of spikes along the divider An official stated that Padsalgikar raised the issues for a road divider from NCPA to Girgaum Chowpatty at the committee meeting. Pedestrians often cross the road by jumping over the divider after negotiating speeding vehicles, which leads to accidents. The committee agreed to put railings along

the divider, after which BMC initiated the process to prepare a plan.

The committee signalled to repair the damaged portion of the Marine Drive promenade, which was has not been done in a decade.

BMC proposal to mark one lane of the road for cycling on Sundays also got a green signal from the committee. BMC had proposed one lane on both sides of the road on the 11km stretch from NCPA to the Worli end of the BandraWorli Sea Link.”We have permission and have shortlisted an agency to organize the event. An NGO is interested in providing cycles on rent near NCPA, Girgaum Chowpatty and Worli. One can hire a cycle at these points and drop them off there too. We plan to start it from December 3.”

BMC’s other proposals to beautify the Marine Drive stretch, also got clearance from the committee. It is also preparing a plan for tree plantation in with consultation with a heritage architect from NCPA to Tambe Chowk (near Girgaum Chowpatty).

A civic chief ordered officials to prepare a detailed beautification plan in which they will restore the Tambe Chowk with in 15 days along with the repair plans of Parsi Gate.

Civic officials are still looking at citizens’ suggestions, including creating a viewing gallery near the NCPA theatre.

Officials said they are also careful not to hinder the view of the sea from the promenade.

In an attempt to find permanent and long lasting solutions for Hyderabad roads, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation has decided to tackle the issue with multipronged strategy. Corporations already have plans to make white topping where water stagnation takes place. Officials have plans to make white tapping for water stagnation. The commissioner said. “Greater Hyderabad, especially the western section, is growing rapidly, due to many multinational and software companies setting up their offices. The erstwhile municipalities of the western section were merged with the GHMC a decade ago, but the area still lacks sewage and storm water drainage system,” he said.

Audrey Azoulay appointed as UNESCO DG The United Nations’ educational, scientific and cultural organisation on 10th November, appointed former French culture minister Audrey Azoulay as its new director general. Audrey succeeds Irina Bokova as the new UNESCO director general. Born on 4 August 1972 in Paris, Audrey is originally from Essaouira and has spent her childhood between France and Morocco. She has studied at the national school for management between 19982000. Azoulay received in 1993 a Master’s Degree in Business Administration from Lancaster University. She became the French Minister of Culture in 2016. Audrey played an important role in planning for preserving the cultural heritage in Iraq after the Islamic State’s attacks on temples.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

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RK Puram gets Delhi’s first Kids public toilet

SDMC opened Delhi’s first toilet for children with colourful paintings and inbuilt infrastructure in RK Puram.

TulsiJoshy, the standing committee member and local councillor, said this novel concept was being introduced to prevent children from defecating in open. “There are many jhuggyjhopdi clusters in the area.

While we developed many public toilets for women and men under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, the kids from these localities were unable to benefit from them,” Joshy said. After surveying children regarding problems they face in adult toilets, SDMC constructed ‘Bal Shuachalaya’ on pilot basis.

To make children habitual users of toilets, the facility arranged attractive colours, alphanumeral graffiti, lower height platforms and smaller doors, as per convenience of children.

There is a separate section for boys and girls. These toilets are constructed in such a way so that differently-abled children can use them. To obtain feedback from the users, the corporation has installed citizen feedback devices in its public toilets.

The corporation has already ordered 400 such devices from Indian Telephone Industries.

The devices have already been installed at 130 toilets and will be installed at 270 more toilets. for “real time feedback” from users.

20 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

NEWSCAN

2.5 million Yemenis lack access to clean water: Red Cross GENEVA: The capital Sanaa and al-Bayda have joined the list of Yemen cities without clean water due to the blockade by a Saudi-led coalition which has cut off supplies of fuel for pumping, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said. Some 2.5 million Yemenis now lack access to clean water in crowded cities, “putting them at risk of another major outbreak of water-borne disease, and other cities are running out of fuel” said ICRC’s Iolanda Jaquemet. Since April, some 940,768 people in Yemen have been infected with cholera, a water-borne disease, in the world’s worst epidemic in a single year that has killed at least 2,200, and cases of dysentery are being reported.

The water and sewage systems in Dhamar and Amaran are now providing only half the normal coverage.” The Saudi-led coalition closed all air, land and sea access to Yemen on November six following the interception of a missile fired towards the Saudi capital, saying it had to stem the flow of arms from Iran to its Houthi opponents in the war in Yemen. The ICRC said three cities - Saada, Taiz and Hodeidah - had run out of clean water because the blockade had cut imports of fuel needed for pumping and sanitation, depriving close to 1 million people of clean water. The United Nations has appealed for the blockade to be lifted, saying it could spark the largest famine the world has seen in decades. Some seven million people are already on the brink of famine.

“The situation for dialysis patients, already urgent, is now critical. The ICRC had reports of some 20 kidney patients requiring dialysis having died over the last weeks “due to the non-availability of treatment”,Jaquemet said.

“Given the current state of supplies, it is expected that dialysis centers in Ibb, Taiz and al-Bayda will soon be forced to close, leaving close to 1,000 patients without the sort of treatment on which their lives depend,” Jaquemet said.

Chennai corporation launches drone mapping of properties Chennai: The Chennai municipal corporation on November 21 became the first municipal body in India to commission drone mapping of properties and utilities. The project was inaugurated

by Tamil Nadu municipal administration minister SP Velumani.

Velumani said that the mapping will facilitate planning of development work for the city on a priority basis.

He added that the corporation had to obtain the consent of directorate general of civil aviation, the ministry of home and defence, Intelligence bureau, the district administrations of Chennai, Kancheepuram and Thiruvallur. The mapping project will be executed by the Hyderabad based company RSI Softech

India Pvt Ltd. The estimated cost of the project is Rs 6.43 crores. Two hexacopters, costing Rs 21 lakh (each) will be used for the project while two quadcopters will be kept on standby. The project will cover 426 sq km area in 120 days.

The project will be supervised by the Tamil Nadu Water supply and drainage board (TWAD). The drones will be fitted with high resolution cameras to capture five images per second. These images will have to be processed by the defence ministry before being available to the corporation. Until the data gets verified by the ministry of defence, it will be kept at a secure site in Ripon buildings under the supervision of an official in the rank of an executive engineer.

NEWSCAN

Facebook launches disaster maps in India The disaster map technology was introduced by Facebook globally in June. It provides organizations with aggregated, de-identified Facebook data so as to fill the gap in information during post disaster management New Delhi: Facebook Inc. launched Disaster Maps for India to help communities across the country share data about disaster victims with humanitarian agencies in a timely manner. The feature was launched at the company’s first Disaster Response Summit on November 9, along with the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) to recover and rebuild the country from natural disasters faster. The technology would improve disaster response and disaster management in India.

As part of the effort, Facebook will make data from Disaster Maps available to the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) and the Sustainable Environment and Ecological Development Society (SEEDS). According to United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) data, India is the third-worst affected country by natural disasters like floods, earthquakes, landslides, cyclones and drought mainly because the response time during and after these disasters is often slow. It takes significant time

and effort to recognize the areas where help is needed most. The technology of Disaster Maps by Facebook, will help to address the gap in data that the government faces while responding to a crisis.

RK Jain, a member of National Disaster Management Authority said, “The NDMA is proactively utilizing social media for awareness generation.

It is an important benchmark towards integrating social media with disaster response activities. I am sure this partnership will open new avenues for using mobile technology in disaster situation.”

Ritesh Mehta, Head of Programmes, India, South and Central Asia at Facebook in the event said, “In times of disaster, our platform is a valuable source of information - whether it’s letting your friends and family know you are safe with safety check feature or using Facebook to raise donations for relief efforts. We want to empower our community by building products that connect people and create positive social impact.”

How do disaster maps work?

The disaster map technology was introduced by Facebook globally in June. It provides organizations with aggregated, de-identified Facebook data so as to fill the gap in information during post disaster management. Facebook provides multiple types of maps during disaster response efforts, which include aggregated location information people have chosen to share with Facebook.

Facebook researchers have built three kinds of maps:

Movement maps

These maps illustrate patterns of movement between different neighbourhoods or cities over a period of several hours. Organizations can better predict where resources will be needed by understanding these patterns. They gain insight into patterns of evacuation, or predict where traffic will be most congested.

Location density maps

These maps show where people are located before, during and after a disaster. “We can if we compare this information to historical records, like population estimates based on satellite images, these data sets can help response organizations understand areas impacted by a natural disaster,” said Facebook in a statement.

Safety Check

Facebook uses these to notify their friends and family that they are safe during a disaster. Safety check uses de-identified data in aggregate to show where more or fewer people check in safe, which will help organizations understand where people are most vulnerable and where help is needed.

It launched the Safety Check feature in 2014 and launched Community Help in 2015, which allows the Facebook community to find & help such as food, shelter and transportation. It is also supporting the pilot project of the ASKDIV (Disaster Information Volunteers) scheme where trained volunteers provides supplementary information to inform relief efforts through the Facebook Workplace platform.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

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EVENT

UMI puts forward smart mobility solutions Urban Mobility India Conference and expo aims at promoting dissemination of information and exchange of ideas on urban transport and mobility issues and the best practices being followed in the cities across the world. At the Hyderabad Conference, initiatives and experiences in respect of various aspects of urban transport of 86 cities including 36 foreign cities were presented as case studies for detailed discussion Hyderabad: A three-day conference on urban transport challenges and solutions was hosted in Hyderabad.

The various topics of discussion were efficient, coordinated use of different modes of transport, ensuring mobility access to all, climate friendly transport planning. ‘Intelligent, Inclusive and Sustainable Mobility’ was the theme of Conference.

The conference was inaugurated by the Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu and was attended by the Telangana CM and the Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri. Around 1,000 policy makers including Mayors and Municipal Councillors from the five southern States, administrators, experts, urban planners, researchers and technology and service providers from over 20 Indian States and 25 foreign countries converged at the iconic HITEX City in Hyderabad for the three-day Conference to discuss challenges and solutions related to transport and mobility in the cities and towns.

UMI Conference aimed at promoting dissemination of information and exchange of ideas on urban transport and mobility issues and the best practices being followed in the cities across the world. At the Hyderabad Conference, initiatives and experiences in respect of various aspects of urban transport of 86 cities including 36 foreign cities were presented as case studies for detailed discussion.

Case studies of foreign cities to be discussed included Boudeau and Lyan (France), Lausanne (Switzerland), Lisbon (Portugal), Gaudalajara (Mexico), Curitiba (Brazil), Bangkok (Thailand), Santiago (Chile), Constantine (Algeria), Cape Town

22 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu addressing the UMI Conference

(South Africa), Rabat (Morocco) and Dhaka (Bangladesh). Indian cities case study was also presented and discussed which included those relating to Hyderabad viz., Road Safety Aspects, Transit Oriented Development and Introduction of Tram Services besides Parking Policy, Planning and Implementation in Vijayawada, initiatives and experiences of Mysuru, Bengaluru, Chennai, Trivandrum, Varanasi, Lucknow, transport planning for Maha Kumbhmela to be held in Allahabad in 2019, Indore, Bhopal, Amritsar, Mumbai, Pune, Delhi, Chandigarh, Kolkata, etc. A total of 60 Plenary, Special and Technical Sessions were held for detailed discussion on Intelligent Transport Solutions, Inclusive Urban Transport and Sustainable Urban Transport Planning.

Intelligent Transport Solutions (ITS) are advanced ICT based applications for enhancing the efficiency of use of different modes of transport in cities through better coordination and by informing the users to make safe, quick and smarter use of transport

networks. ITS are used for effective management of traffic and mobility.

Urban Transport Planning seeks to ensure the right of access to public spaces and particularly, to public transport systems for all. Sustainable Urban Transport and Mobility aims at integrating environmental concerns with transport planning so that urban residents are not deprived of quality air.

Hyderabad Conference deliberated on various components of the chain of urban transport from conceptualization of urban transport projects, design, financing and execution. The broad themes discussed included: Mobility for All, Multi-modal Integration, Inclusive Planning, New Paradigms of Mobility, Smart Cities and Mobility, Electric Mobility, Shared Mobility, Linking Urban Transport and Environment, Informal Transport Systems, Using Urban Transport Planning as an Opportunity, Efficient and Sustainable City Bus Service Systems, Financial Planning for Urban Transport Projects, Land Value Capture & Transit Oriented Development and Metro Rail Policy.

NEWSCAN

Chandigarh to Mysuru gets Best NonMotorised Transport Award save termiteHyderabad: Surat Municipal Corporation has been chosen for the ‘Best City Bus Services Award’ by the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs for succeeding in attracting 87% of the private vehicle and auto rickshaw users to use city buses. Mysuru’s Public Bicycle Sharing has won the ‘Best NonMotorised Transport’ Award while Kochi (Kerala) has been chosen for the ‘Best Urban Transport Initiative’ Award for completing its Metro Rail Project in a quick time besides integrating the metro with other modes of transport.

The Awards for the ‘Best Urban Transport Practices’ were announced by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs on the concluding day of the three day Urban Mobility Conference –cum-Exhibition at Hyderabad.

Surat city with a population of about 45 lakhs was heavily dependent on three wheelers and private vehicles till 2014 when Bus Rapid Transport System

(BRTS) and city buses were made operational. At present, 275 city buses are operational in the city on 28 routes with fares ranging from a minimum of Rs.4.00 to a maximum of Rs.22. With 95% of arrivals and departures on time, 87% of those using private vehicles and auto rickshaws have now shifted to city buses minimizing environmental and social adversity issues. Single ticketing system, Integration of city buses with feeder systems, Intelligent Transit Management are in place.

The tourism city of Mysore launched its Public Bicycle Sharing in June this year with 425 bicycles and 45 docking stations. More than 6,400 members have been registered till last month. Fares are as low as Rs 5 for up to two hours of use. PBS resulted in improved last mile connectivity besides converting short distance vehicular trips to cycle trips, which are ecofriendly.

hit trees

CHANDIGARH: The campaign for saving trees from termite was attended by more than a dozen tree lovers. For this campaign, Chandigarh Mayor Asha Jaswal along with city-based horticulturist and tree lover, Rahul Mahajan, took a lead and launched a campaign to save the city’s termite-hit trees from Sector 19.

“The motive behind this campaign is to involve people into it. It also aims to encourage the government machinery to adopt it like a routine practice. The problem of termite is increasing in Chandigarh. If we want to increase the green cover within the city and save the existing green cover, we should adopt sincere efforts to curb the termite menace,” said Mahajan.

The mayor said the Municipal Corporation of Chandigarh has organized a survey and found that there are 1.65 lakh trees in the city looked after by MCC. She said that the horticulture wing of MCC is already putting chlorpyrifos on the termite-hit trees and to remove the dead and dangerous trees. During the survey the MCC found 1,029 dead trees in the city and started the work of eliminating them as they would cause damage to lives and public property as well.

Jaswal informed that she took stock of the status of trees in the city including those in road sides and parks and have instructed the concerned officers to conduct survey and identify the damaged trees hit by termite attack.

She further said that thematic drives including parks, green belts, schools, government buildings, road sides will be planned and proper treatment of trees will be conducted.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

23

COVER STORY | Climate Change & Cities

COVER STORY | Climate Change & Cities

24 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

CITIES CLIMATE CHANGE

& THE CRISIS

From cities as big as New Delhi to small ones like Gopalpur in Odisha and everywhere in between, citizens are affected by the historical rise in population, pollution and climate change-induced disasters. All these issues are converging in cities and posing a threat to urban dwellers especially to the underprivileged

Abhishek Pandey | Editor

C

ities continue to grow in both numbers of people and economic activities.

More economic activities, in the present context, mean more emissions. Cities and the issues related to climate change are closely linked. Cities contribute to climate change in a big way—from fossil fuel consumption for electricity generation, running of vehicles and industrial production; to change in land use, reckless exploitation of natural resources and irresponsible waste disposal.

Reports suggest that cities are responsible for over 70 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. As cities continue to fill the atmosphere with deadly pollutants, people are experiencing longer droughts, erratic rainfalls, deadlier storms and frequent trips to hospitals. The impact of climate change on finances of the city can be just as devastating as the physical ones.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

25

Numerographs COVER STORY | Climate | Air Quality Change Index & Cities (AQI)

Combating Climate C Climate Change has emerged as one of the biggest challenges to life on earth. From rising sea level to pollution in cities across the globe, it has caused immense consternation. While world debates look for a solution, here are some startling figures that underline the gravity of the situation and crying need to battle it urgently

AQI In Indian Cities (as on Nov 27, 2017) 424

Muzaffarpur

413

Ghaziabad

365

Varanasi

362

Delhi

347

Noida 168

Udaipur 129

Pune Thiruvananthapuram

76

Tirupati

75 65

Bengaluru 0

AQI Standards

Severe Very Poor Moderate Satisfactory

100

200

300

400

Indian: PM 2.5 (40µg/m3)

500

WHO: PM 2.5 (10µg/m3)

Top Densely Populated Cities (Per Sq Km) 400

Dhaka

Mumbai

44,500

31,700

362

Manila

350

Average Life Expectancy

14,800 300

AQI

250 200

Kota

Delhi

12,100

11,297

Singapore 10,200

150 100

151 145

74

71

50

86 67 73 64 67

68

6,158

50

9

M

7,962

Dh a

9,600

0

Tokyo

M

Washington

35

ka um ba i an ila Ko ta De lh Si ng i ap or e Ja k W as arta hi ng to n To ky o

21

Jakarta

78 83

82

Timeline

1994

1995

1996

19971998

19992000

UNFCCC

COP 1

COP 2

COP 3&4

COP 5&6

United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change enters into Force; signed by 196 countries

Conference of the Parties Berlin, Germany; discussed about some of the first joint measures in international climate action

Geneva, Switzerland; Called for “legally binding mid-term targets”

COP 3 Kyoto, Japan; Kyoto protocol was adopted.

COP 4 at Buenos Aires; 2-year “Plan of Action” to implement the Protocol adopted

COP 5 at Bonn; Technical interventions to curb carbon emissions.

COP 6 at Netherlands; proposal to allow credit for carbon “sinks” in forests

26 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Change Team UrbanUpdate

Application of BSES in INDIA (4Wheel Vehicles) Standard

Equivalent to

Year

Region

India 2000 Bharat Stage II Bharat Stage III Bharat Stage IV Bharat Stage V Bharat Stage VI

Euro 1 Euro 2 Euro 3 Euro 4 Euro 5 Euro 6

2000 2001 - 05 2005 - 10 2010 - 17 To Be Skipped 2018 - 20

Nationwide NCR/ Nationwide NCR/ Nationwide NCR/ Nationwide NCR/ Nationwide

Bharat Stage Emission Standards are norms instituted by the government to regulate the output of air pollutants from internal combustion engine equipment. India’s recent decision of shifting from BS 4 to BS 6 fuel till 2018 seems an effective decision to curb the ongoing pollution chaos, but its implementation stands as a question

Major strategies for negative emission technologies Natural (Forestry/ Agriculture)

Combined (Natural+ Technological)

Technological (Energy/ Industry)

Afforestation/ Reforestation Tree growth takes up CO2 from the atmosphere

Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) Plants turn CO2 into biomass that fuels energy systems; CO2 from conversion is stored underground

Accelerated Weathering Natural minerals react with CO2 and bind them in new minerals

Biochar Partly burnt biomass is added to soil absorbing additional CO2 Soil Carbon Sequestration Land management changes increase the soil carbon content, resulting in a net removal of CO2 from the atmosphere

Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement Alkaline materials are added to the ocean to enhance atmospheric drawdown and negate acidification CO2 to Durable Carbon CO2 is removed from the atmosphere and bound in long-lived materials

Other LandUse/Wetlands Restoration or construction of high carbon density, anaerobic ecosystems • • •

Direct Air Capture CO2 is removed from ambient air and stored underground

• •

Less Costly Closer To Development More Vulnerable to reversal

•

More Costly Greater R&D needs Less Vulnerable to Reversal

Source: WEF, WHO, aquicn.org, UN environment, UNFCC, UNDP, Emission Gap Report 2017

2001

2002

2003

2004

20052006

COP 7

COP 8

COP 9

COP 10

COP 11 & 12

Marrakech, Morocco; Marrakech Accords applied for setting the stage for ratification of the Kyoto Protocol

New Delhi, India; adopted the Delhi Ministerial Declaration for efforts to reduce the impact of climate change on developing countries

Milan, Italy; The parties agreed to use the adaptation fund established at COP7

Buenos Aires, Argentina; Discussed the progress made since the first Conference of the Parties, The Buenos Aires Plan of Action adopted

Montreal, Canada; EU Emissions Trading Launched, Montreal Action Plan adopted & Kenya; Clean Development Mechanism Opens; The Nairobi Work Programme NWP activities begin

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

27

COVER STORY | Climate Change & Cities

Unexpected expenditures from storms, flooding, and drought can lead to major disruptions in business operations and city budgets. Increasing temperatures, heat waves, changing precipitation patterns, intensification of extreme weather events and rising sea levels have become a reality. Such changes have also challenged many traditional industries in peri-urban regions like agriculture, fishing, and forestry. They are facing new obstacles.

Cities may be taking some steps to tackle climate change related issues but they need to treat the problem rather than the symptom. The major problem lies in ever-increasing emission rates of cities. Reducing emissions drastically, adopting measures for negative emissions and sustainable lifestyle are required more than ever.

The World Resource Institute did a case study of Arnala village that is situated along the north-western coast of Mumbai. Lubaina Rangwala, Managing Associate, Climate Resilience Practice, WRI, wrote in her report that the village has a predominantly agrarian and fishing economy and a population of 19,350 people. Using this village as a case study, the institute conducted research to document and analyze the interconnected impacts of urbanization and climate change on the livelihoods of fishing and agriculture-based communities in peri-urban coastal areas.

The report says that villages like Arnala demand attention because due to increasing levels of climate uncertainty and regional pressure, youth in the village are gradually moving away from the village’s traditional industries. Rap-

id urbanization in the region and poor waste management systems have resulted in water pollution, straining the fishing industry. Indeed, urban expansion in coastal cities (or their peripheries) often results in the deterioration of mangroves, threatening fish species and driving down profits for fisheries.

This is not the story of just Arnala. The situation is the same in many cities, even in the land locked regions.

Often people who are on the frontline of climate change induced risks are the least responsible for the crisis.

Urban poor are the first ones who suffer the worst consequences of disasters whether it is flooding in Chennai or collapse of a portion of Ghazipur landfill. They have weak safeguards.

Recently, Delhi witnessed ‘severe’ air pollution level when PM2.5 and PM10 concentration crossed the ‘emergency’ threshold. National Green Tribunal (NGT) and the Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority (EPCA) for the National Capital Region banned construction related activities including stone crushing, road construction activities, closed brick kilns and power plants in the national capital as proposed in the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP). It was aimed to bring down the pollution level. In the given scheme of things, the poor daily wage labourers suffered economically for no fault of theirs. With the change in weather and wind flow, the crisis will be over and the situation will get back to normal but who will compensate the losses of the poor? How are the governments and other agencies going to address this?

Bhure Lal, Chairman of EPCA, has said in a written reply to the Apex Court that “...GRAP is designed as a response plan to rising pollution and not a substitute for long-term actions....”

Then why is there no concrete longterm action plan? The government has not banned diesel vehicles from plying on the roads, power plants are still operating in the city, no major overhaul in the policy for making the use of private cars more expensive and no visible efforts to increase the frequency and connectivity of buses in the capital city.

The recent hike in metro fares added to the woes as the ridership went down.

While implementing climate change action plans, the government needs to address the issues of climate justice that the Government of India had raised in COP21 in Paris. The logic was that the developed countries contrib uted to GHG emission because of increased industrial activities thus they must be held accountable and must pay to the least developed and developing countries who did not contribute to global warming but are facing climate change induced risks. Many island nations including the host country of this year’s COP-Fiji are facing an existential crisis.

Why is such logic not applicable at the local level? Why should the poor, who are the least responsible, pay the price?

Governments at all levels, local, state and centre, must develop consensus and bring changes in policies to reduce emission in the cities. There is no simple solution to this as various complex issues are interlinked with roles of many government and nongovernment agencies. National Green

2007

2008

2009

20102011

2012

COP 13

COP 14

COP 15

COP 16 & 17

COP 18

Bali, Indonesia; Parties adopt the Bali Road Map

Poznan, Poland; Kyoto Protocol mechanism ‘Joint Implementation’ starts

Copenhagan, Denmark; The Copenhagen Accord implemented

Cancun, Mexico; Results in the Cancun Agreements COP 17 in 2011 at South Africa; ‘Momentum for Change’ launched.

Doha, Qatar; Governments agree to speedily work toward a universal climate change agreement by 2015

28 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Many European cities had started developing cycle-friendly infrastructure almost a decade ago as it was hailed as a great cost-effective and environment-friendly alternative to fossil fuel-run vehicles.

Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Malmo, Dublin, Montreal, Vienna, Berlin, Barcelona and a host of Chinese cities are some fine examples.

While in India, cities did make some efforts to build cycle lanes and bike docks, the fundamental issues related to their success have not been addressed

Tribunal (NGT) and EPCA have limited powers to take action against the emitters. It has been a regular occurrence that government bodies have failed to implement the actions suggested by the NGT or EPCA. For example, there is a clear directive of EPCA to issue warning in case of poor air quality but no such mechanism exists. The government officials are just informing people through newspapers and media channels. In another case, Delhi had implemented vehicle rationing scheme last year to bring down pollution levels but

the application of the scheme had too many loopholes. The NGT had asked to do away with exemptions and bring two-wheelers under the purview of the Odd-Even scheme.

Delhi is not the only city that is facing the issue of severe air pollution.

However, it is undoubtedly among the most polluted cities in the world; yet it has no innovative solution at its disposal to address the problem. Indian cities can learn from the experience of global cities and their action plans to tackle the problem.

What are other cities doing to curtail air pollution?

Stringent norms against the emitters, a more effective vehicle and road rationing scheme and smog-sucking towers are among the few measures that have helped Chinese cities to bring down their emission and curtail air pollution. In many Chinese cities, vehicle rationing system automatically becomes effective when the air quality plummets. The warning alarm system is also strong. Citizens get a message on their mobile phones if air pollution reaches dangerous level.

Many European cities had started developing cycle-friendly infrastructure almost a decade ago as it was hailed as a great cost-effective and environmentfriendly alternative to fossil fuel-run vehicles. Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Malmo, Dublin, Montreal, Vienna, Berlin, Barcelona and a host of Chinese cities are some fine examples. While in India, cities did make some efforts to build cycle lanes and bike docks, the fundamental issues related to their success

have not been addressed. For example: Lucknow, Noida and Delhi built cycle lanes but these paths are encroached upon by street vendors or locals using them as parking space. India may be world famous for its IT talent but this has not been used for solving basic civic issues. Cycles in China can be rented through a mobile app, locked through digital code, returned anywhere in the city and the payment for the service can be made online. Authorities in Indian cities or any private party have not done this as even in the national Capital, the general public has no idea from where to rent cycles. However, the lower middle class still has no option but to ride bicycles in our cities but as soon as they can afford one, they buy a two-wheeler.

The first major hurdle is non-availability of continuous cycle track within the city and it makes cycling unsafe and inconvenient. According to the statistics of government of India, cyclists and pedestrians account for almost 60 per cent of total deaths in road accidents.

Buildings too are big energy guzzlers.

The concept of green buildings in India has not picked up pace yet. However, Bureau of Energy Efficiency with UNDP have started Energy Conservation Building Code cells in many states but the concept has not picked up yet at the ground level to make a difference in cutting emission levels of cities. These steps need to be expedited for building more liveable cities for our citizens and to leave a healthy ecosystem for future generations. For this, cities would have to reduce their ravenous appetite for energy in a time-bound manner & the role of local bodies will be central.

2013

2014

2015

2016

2017

COP 19

COP 20

COP 21

COP 22

COP 23

Warsaw, Poland; Discussions on the drivers of deforestation and forest degradation

Lima, Peru; Lima Call for Climate Action launched

Paris, France; Historical Paris climate change agreement adopted

Marrakesh, Morocco; Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Action launched

Bonn, Germany; The meeting was focused to “prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.�

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

29

Leaderspeak | COP 23

Ranjit S Chavan President, AIILSG

Takeaways from Bonn The recently concluded 23rd edition of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Bonn was termed a damp squib by many environmentalists as there was no clear-cut outcome on discussions related to the issues of finance, loss and damage, and ‘pre-2020 actions’. Even the clause of finance and technology transfer was added in the last minute after developing countries raised the issue of no mention of the same. One of the main outcomes of the conference was the Talanoa Dialogue

M

any European countries including Germany emphasised the importance of working together to deal with the climate change crisis. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said, “This conference must send out the serious signal that the Paris Agreement was a starting point, but the work has only begun.” Today’s pledges in the nationally-determined contributions were not enough to keep global temperature rise below 2 degrees Celsius, she said. “Now it’s about walking the talk.”

This is to see how Germany and other developing nations keep their promise.

The recent anticipation by Germany’s environment ministry fears high emissions from coal-fired power plants

30 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

and transport will make the country miss its 2020 climate targets by a wider margin.

The measures countries have committed to under the Paris Agreement are voluntary but there has been no mechanism to double-check the progress of the countries. The rulebook for the historical Paris Conference could not be finalised in Bonn and is expected to be completed by Dec 2018. The rule book will establish the rules and processes needed to provide the operational guidance for fulfilling the ambition of the Agreement and providing clarity on countries’ efforts to reach the global goal. Developing countries reiterated that the developed nations are not extending the required financial assistance to under-developed and developing nations. In the twoweek long conference, many

developing countries including India have demanded sure-shot deliverance of their promises including the commitments made under the Kyoto protocol that will expire in 2020. Several amendments were made in the protocol in Doha and extended the mandate of developed nations to make the GHG emission cuts till 2020. India, Brazil, China and South Africa have also expressed serious concern over the attempts of some developed countries to tweak the criteria for providing finance to the developing countries through multilateral funding agencies.

India at COP23

India requires over one trillion dollars for its fight against climate change. Raji Gain, chief general manager of NABARD, said in Bonn

that the country needed $206bn to support plans to curb emissions, $189bn to execute national and statelevel climate action plans and $834bn for low carbon growth-related mitigation.

India also demanded that developing countries must reveal how much money they would contribute to the first tranche of 100 billion that is to be made available to developed countries by 2020.

India anchored the issues of sustainable lifestyle and climate justice at the conference. Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Dr Harsh Vardhan said climate change will put a disproportionate burden on the poor and marginalised sections of the global community. He added that scientific evidence clearly indicates the severity of climate change and the cost of delayed action. “Access to clean air, water, and a livable climate are inalienable human rights.

And solving this crisis is just not a question of politics, it is our moral obligation”, Dr Vardhan said. Emphasising that though India’s per capita emissions are only one-third of the global average and its contribution to the global stock of carbon dioxide is less than 3 per cent, India has still moved ahead with implementation of path-breaking initiatives. Many developing countries including the host country Fiji and India pushed

for setting the target of preventing global temperature rise beyond 1.5 degree Celsius from pre-industrial levels. Though, the Paris Agreement had set the threshold of 2 degree Celsius. Fiji Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama said, “We must not fail our people. That means using the next two weeks and the year ahead to do everything we can to make the Paris Agreement work and to advance ambition and support for climate action before 2020. To meet our commitments in full, not back away from them. And to commit ourselves to the most ambitious target of the Paris Agreement. To cap the global average temperature at 1.5 degrees Celsius over that of the pre-industrial age.”

Problem with the solution!

With 197 signatories, the 2015 Paris Agreement marked an important milestone for global climate talks, specifically for its encouragement of governments to reduce carbon emissions to limit global warming to below 2°C. According to Emissions Gap Report, the NDCs that form the foundation of the Paris Agreement cover only approximately one-third of the emissions reductions needed to be on a least-cost pathway for the goal of staying well below 2°C. The gap between the reductions needed and the national pledges made in Paris

is alarmingly high.SecretaryGeneral of the United Nations AntónioGuterres said in his opening remarks, “Climate change is the defining threat of our time. Our duty -- to each other and to future generations -- is to raise ambition.

We need to do more on five ambition action areas: emissions, adaptation, finance, partnerships and leadership.”

After Trump decided to withdraw its support from the Climate Change, over 250 local governments in America reiterated that they would implement the Paris agreement locally. However, the pullout decision has affected the efforts in gathering necessary funds for climate actions as the capability of the USA to mobilise financial resources is beyond compare. Technically, the pullout decision will not be effective until November 2020. French President Emmanuel Macron said that “we can all come together” to mobilise the necessary public and private funds to act on climate. To guarantee quality science needed to make climate policy decisions, Macron proposed that the EU should fill the financing gap for the IPCC left open by the US administration’s decision to reduce funding. Now, all eyes are on participating developed countries to know: will they keep their word and support the global cause without tweaking the commitments to their benefit?

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

31

Article | Money & Climate Change

Funding the fight

against climate change A few weeks ago several Indian states were to suffer yet again from nature’s fury while others braced for its coming impact. Cyclone Ockhi, after devastating the coasts of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and the Lakshadweep islands, moved towards Maharashtra and Gujarat once again highlighting the deadly natural disasters caused by climate change

V Vijaykumar Sr Advisor, AIILSG

T

he spectre of climate change we are witnessing now has galvanized the global community into action. Its effects like rising sea levels, melting glaciers, extreme weather events, droughts and floods have brought the issue centre-stage and highlighted the severe economic and humanitarian dimensions of the phenomenon.

The Paris Agreement which was put together under the auspices of the UNFCCC at COP 21 in 2015 is a landmark event. This Agreement which came into force in November 2016, when the threshold of 55 countries signed into it, resolves to take several initiatives to keep in this century, global temperature rise to well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and make greater efforts to limit the increase even further to below 1.5 degree Celsius. Among various measures, the Agreement requires

32 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

signatories to submit Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) to be recorded centrally and a stock taking done once every five years.

Climate action funding has been a core subject of climate negotiations on the global stage. At the

`

Conference of Parties at Copenhagen in 2009, developed countries pledged to jointly raise US$ 100 billion a year by 2020 in order to support climate action in developing countries. This fund aims to support poorer countries’ investment in renewable energy and green technologies, among others. These poorer counties are considered by many as those least responsible for GHG emissions and the resulting environmental degradation. At the same time these end up as the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. Quite naturally, this realization is not universal. In terms of vulnerability, some of the least developed countries are small island nations whose very survival is threatened by sea level rise, a macabre outcome of global warming. The initial

pledges towards the fund were by Japan ($ 1.5 billion), UK ($1.2billion) France ($ 1 billion) Germany ($ 1 billion) and the USA, before President Trump pulled out of the accord with $ 3 billion. The sum total of announced pledges as of mid-November 2017 was $ 10.1 billion.

Financing is a key input in our battle against climate change.

Large resources are needed to fund mitigation and adaptation efforts all over the globe, particularly in the less developed countries. One can see that the contributions pledged by some of the richest nations appear to be miniscule in comparison to the targeted $ 100 billion. However even this $100 billion seems well short of the projected financial flows needed.

A UNFCCC paper estimated annual investment needs of $ 432 billion in 2030 for the power generation and supply sector alone, in big measure to finance renewables, nuclear and hydro power capacities. About 46 percent of this is the estimated requirement for developing countries which could result in 68 per cent of the total emission reduction.

Financing of climate action in developing countries will be key to achieving desired outcome on global climate change.

In a business-asusual scenario, rapid economic growth in these countries coupled with sharply rising energy consumption will contribute to

Climate action funding has been a core subject of climate negotiations on the global stage. At the Conference of Parties at Copenhagen in 2009, developed countries pledged to jointly raise US$ 100 billion a year by 2020 in order to support climate action in developing countries. This fund aims to support poorer countries’ investment in renewable energy and green technologies, among others emissions. In the absence of such investments, the developing countries, seeking economic growth in any case, will be pushed along less benign paths to power economic growth and thus lead to higher emissions for decades to come. The replacement of energy sources with renewables and sustainable options needs to happen soon in view of the large life cycle of investments in the sector. That is, an investment made today in nonenvironment-friendly capacity can continue to damage the environment for several decades.

Sizeable investments could also be called for to support economic diversification for developing countries which are highly dependent on

income from fossil fuels.

Other areas which call for significant capital outlays are transportation (investment in energy efficient public transport), waste management (methane capture), water conservation (to prevent use of groundwater) and agriculture (water saving and afforestation). The requirements seem daunting but these will be required considering the scale and pace of economic degradation currently being experienced. Long term policy clarity and continuity with respect to renewables and benign technologies will be required to encourage large private investments in capital assets which are climate friendly. Similarly private investments may need large doses of fiscal incentives for investments in clean technologies especially directed at the developing countries.

Such incentives could offset the risks associated with new technologies and technological obsolescence.

Another mechanism to direct funding could be strengthening the carbon market through which richer countries could make climate change mitigation investments in less developed countries and earn carbon credits to offset their emissions at home. Stiff levies and penalties on use of climate unfriendly technologies will reinforce the ‘polluter pays’ principle while making available funds for climate action. It will also accelerate the shift towards climate friendly ways of life.

The world will have to find all the will, the tools, the technologies and of course the money to ward off the ills of climate change. And do it sooner rather than later if we are to leave a better planet for future generations. As the saying goes “We don’t inherit the planet from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children”.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

33

Article | COP 23 & Beyond

Cities need to invest in living

infrastructures to be climate resilient

Ranjan K Panda Convener, Combat Climate Change Network

C

OP 23, the UN Climate Change Conference at Bonn, held during 6th to 17th November this year, brought together over 16,000 participants, including about 9,200 government officials, 5,500 representatives of UN bodies and agencies, intergovernmental organisations and civil society organisations, and 1,200 members of the media.

On the ‘Global Action Day for Water’ during the COP 23 UN Climate Change Conference at Bonn, representatives of international communities signed a “nature-based solution declaration” to

34 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

“encourage the use of natural systems in managing healthy water supplies.” It has been estimated that financing of water adaptation activities would have to be to the tune of 295 billion USD to meet the targets envisaged by these plans in meeting the Paris Goals.

Even though majority of national climate plans prioritize actions on water, there is need to do a lot more, it was felt during events on this day at COP. Water needs to emerge as a much bigger priority in national policies and the links of water be established with other key sectors such as energy, food security, health and education, it was felt. It was also felt there is a growing need for closer cooperation with people and institutions working on climate change among themselves as well as with those who are working on urban issues and other pertinent issues such as agriculture, energy, health and oceans.

The need for resilient cities in the context of water use and management was flagged in the events on the Action Day. Mariet Verhoef-Cohen, President of the Women for Water Partnership,

and Co-Chair of Water Scarcity in Agriculture Platform (WASAG) said, “Sustainable use of water for multiple purposes must remain a way of life and needs to be at the center of building resilient cities and human settlements and ensuring food security in a climate change context.” The events have rightly called for harmonizing water and climate policies.

Cities need to prioritise climate action

This COP was unique because for the first time a small island country was given the presidential role. The COP 23 was presided over by Frank Bainimarama, the Prime Minister of Fiji. At the opening, Bainimarama said, “The human suffering caused by intensifying hurricanes, wildfires, droughts, floods and threats to food security caused by climate change means there is no time to waste.”

Cities are not only a major contributor to climate change but also vulnerable to its impacts. A UN report estimates that the current world population of 7.6

billion, which is expected to reach to about 8.6 billion by 2030, will grow to 9.8 billion by 2050. Another estimate says that 65 per cent of global population will be living in cities by 2030, and most of the additional population projected by 2050 will be added to cities. Cities are already consuming somewhere between 75 to 78 per cent of world’s energy and produce about 76 per cent of all carbon dioxide and significant amounts of other greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, cities have been impacted by frequent floods and other devastations due to storm surges, sea level rise, increasing heat and heatwave conditions andso on and so forth.

With recent frightening data about faster ice melt and sea rise, climate resilience of cities across the world has come in for a fresh review. At Bonn, a lot of innovative ways were at display to make cities climate resilient. From trying to become 100 per cent renewable energy based cities to ensuring equity in infrastructure and services to the poor so that they can better cope with the impacts of climate change, cities have been trying many ways to be climate resilient.

Taking the Nature’s ways

What attracts us are some of the ways the cities are trying to take to promote ‘living infrastructure.’ It is being increasingly admitted that cities need to have living infrastructure in order to be able to deliver social, environmental and economic services to their inhabitants. Barbara Norman, Chair of Urban & Regional Planning and Director of Canberra Urban & Regional Futures, University of Canberra, in an article published by The Conversation, believes, “This is done by integrating trees, shrubs, grass and open spaces (green infrastructure); rainscapes and waterways (blue infrastructure); and soils, surface and man-made structures (grey infrastructure) into the fabric of the city”.

Sponge cities: an example of living infrastructure Cities are facing both water scarcity and flooding. What they can do is to

innovate new ways, looking into their geographical positioning, to manage their water resources to help fight both scarcity and abundance and be climate resilient. A model that is being globally reported at the moment is called the ‘sponge cities’. The ‘sponge city’ retains almost all the rainwater it receives and uses it in a planned manner. Harvesting rainwater has been a traditional way in most parts of India, a knowledge which our planners are losing fast and our cities have failed to inherit despite getting a lot of rural population into their fold with each passing year. Our cities have lost most of their surface water bodies such as lakes, ponds and other such structures which helped them harvest rainwater, recharge ground water and come to their rescue both during drought years and heavy rainfall years.

China, it is reported, is taking the concept of ‘sponge cities’ seriously.

That country is faced with the dual challenge of rapid urbanisation and poor water management like none else. China’s state owned media Xinhua News reported, “Of 657 cities assessed by the Ministry of Housing and UrbanRural Development, about half are considered water scarce or severely water scarce, according to the standards of the United Nations.” Another half of the Chinese cities are unable to reach national standards of flood prevention.

Official versions reported in media say that, of the more than 230 cities affected by flooding in 2013, 90 per cent of the older urban areas did not even have basic flood plans.

In 2013, the Chinese President called for development of sponge cities and the next year the government pledged billions of dollars in support for building 16 sponge cities across the country. The sponge cities will have different designs for different cities. For the Mass Sports Center of South China’s Shenzhen City, an area of 118,403 square feet has been developed with porous bricks and flood-tolerant plants. During rains, the permeable pavements and rain gardens would soak up most of the rainwater. Some of this collected water will infiltrate into the subsurface soil, recharging aquifers, and the rest would

percolate down to a cistern buried below the plaza and then be used for irrigation or cleaning.

There are various other models of sponge cities being innovated throughout the globe. Rooftop gardens, vegetation cover of walls of tall buildings and many more types of models to capture and store rainwater for use in various purposes that has been using freshwater for generations.

As per calculations made by Alicia An, a professor of energy and environment at the City University of Hong Kong, as reported in the Guardian, “a cluster of buildings at her university installed with rooftop gardens could catch enough rain to replace upo half of all the toilet water they use. The balmy gardens would also reduce the tropical air temperature by around 1.3C nearby, reducing the energy needed to cool the building”.

Indians can lead the way

In India, many studies are available to show the importance of such concepts.

More importantly, as we have already discussed, India has a long history and tradition of harvesting and using rainwater. What it needs now is to aggressively push these concepts in urban planning.

While buildings, apartments and other infrastructures being built in urban areas should have these ‘sponge city’ concept integrated, India should do its best to save all the surface water bodies and rivers. Time planners understood that roof top rainwater harvesting is not a substitute for lakes, ponds and other waterbodies, but a supplement.

Then there are many more actions cities need to take. They must now contribute prominently in saving river basins from further degradation, support forest conservation in catchment areas of the river basins, participate in source management and protection of all the water sources they are dependent on – both inside their limits and outside.

And finally, living infrastructures such as mangrove forests need be taken special care of, as they protect cities and coasts from vagaries of climate induced disasters, whose frequency and intensity are growing by the year.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

35

Article | Climate Financing & ULBs

Local bodies need to be part of climate agenda Kamlesh Kumar Pathak Climate Change Mitigation Expert

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s the world grapples with climate crisis, cities have gained increasing recognition as battlegrounds in the fight against climate change. Climate finance for cities and Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) is becoming more important than ever. A combination of national and international financial resources, drawn from public and private climate finance sources could be key enabler for Urban Local Bodies’ ambition for climate action. It is therefore important for Indian ULBs to define their climate finance resources as a crucial effort to meet goals on climate change.

The article is an effort to mainstream agenda of climate finance landscape, financing options and access modalities within Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) budgetary governance.

India has witnessed many instances of extremes of temperature and rainfall in recent years, for example Uttarakhand floods in 2013, Kashmir floods in 2014 &2015, super cyclone Hud Hud in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh (2014). India faces huge losses due to climate change induced disasters.Its expense on adaptation increased from 2.6 per centof the country’s GDP in

36 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

2012 to 6 per cent of 2014. The continued weather disasters and damage to urban infrastructure demands that policy makers and local governments augment financial resources to support climate action in cities and ULBs.

Where does Indian local government stand between rapid urbanisation and climate agenda?

For ULBs in developing countries like India, climate change is a major challenge causing large scale climate variability and enhanced risks. Though India’s position on climate change has seen radical change in perception around issue of climate change policies and implementation arrangements, local governments have been largely absent from strategic policy making committees and are actually considered only as implementation contractors.

India faces a formidable and complex challenge meeting the pressure of infrastructure deficit in view of development agenda in a set up of democratic process which demands more equal and progressive society. Indian economy is facing a huge challenge of accelerating deployment of policies and programmes towards ensuring transition into a developed economy through sustained investment and growth in industry and urban sector.

Almost all the macroeconomic models predict that anticipated needs and demands for natural resources in the future will belarge. High growth urbanisation will be a consistent economic trend and indicator for prosperity; about 40 per cent of the population in 2030 would be urban as against 31

per cent currently. As the population expands in the urban areas, economy of the country and income of individual grows, we could see exponential increase in demand for urban amneties like housing, urban space, streets, transport infrastructure, energy, water, and waste management and disposal facilities

Need for urban resilient policies, framework and infrastructure

With the launch of transformational urban schemes, Government of India has provided a clear mandate to Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) to create the new cities on Resilience Framework. Under the Smart Cities Mission, 100 smart cities are planned with the objective to develop new generation cities, which will provide core infrastructure and a decent quality of life to its citizens by building a clean and sustainable environment.

But, the success of the programme will remain subject to scrutiny on indicators of urban resilience, new urban agenda and SDGs. Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) for 500 cities focuses on ensuring basic infrastructure services such as water supply, sewerage, storm water drains, transport and development of green spaces and parks by adopting climate resilient and energy efficient policies and regulations.

These schemes open the gateway to innovative arrangement between National and Local Governments to act on climate actions.

Indian Government has provided

ULBs with tremendous scope to demonstrate leadership and climate statesmanship by implementing innovative projects through schemes of Swachh Bharat Mission (Clean India Mission), vision of Urban Transport Policies and Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016.

Above all, the intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) response to COP decisions 1/CP.19 and1/ CP.20 for the period 2021 to 2030 acknowledges a number of mitigation and adaptation strategies and action with focus on cities and urban centers.

India is committed to reduce the emissions intensity of its GDP by 33 to 35 percent by 2030 from 2005 level. India cannot fulfill the commitment without the contribution of ULBs.

India’s domestic climate finance instruments

Finance will remain a critical enabler for Urban Local Bodies for climate change action. However it appears very difficult to quantify the finance requirements for adaptation and mitigation for a country with so much diversity. Though the numbers from variety of studies vary, preliminary estimates indicate that India would need around USD 206 billion (at 2014-15prices) between 2015 and 2030 for implementing adaptation actions in agriculture, forestry, fisheries infrastructure, water resources and ecosystems. Apart from this there will beadditional investments needed for strengthening resilience and disaster management.

An Asian Development Bank Study on assessing the costs of climate change adaptation in SouthAsia indicates that approximate adaptation cost for India in energy sector alone would be about USD 7.7 billion in 2030s. The report also projects the economic damageand losses in India from climate change to be around 1.8% of its GDP annually by 2050.Mitigation requirements are even more enormous. Estimates by NationalInstitution for Transforming India(NITI Aayog) indicate that the mitigation activities for moderate lowcarbon development would cost around USD 834 billion till 2030 at 2011 pric-

es. India’s climate actions have so far been largely financed from domestic resources. While this would evolve over time, a preliminary estimate suggests that at least USD 2.5 trillion (at 201415 prices) will be required for meeting India’s climate change actions between now and 2030. Government of India’s climate finance instruments remain very limited with only dedicated funds at national level for mobilization of climate funds for mitigation and adaptation activities.

How climate funds can help ULBs to create climate resilient and low carbon infrastructure

Cities in the world are facing critical challenges in planning and financing infrastructure in a manner which is climate safe and resilient. International public climate finance is a fraction of total finance flows, but has potential to play a pivotal role in helping Urban Local Bodies.

This might mean crowding-in further finance for specificinfrastructure investments, allowing local intermediaries to employ their own resources to greater effect, or improving the capacities of institutions at different levels to create policy, regulatory and technical environments that steer wider investment towards sustainable urban development.

There are growing trends on evolving of new institutions, mechanisms and instruments that can channel finance from climate funds and can create opportunities for engagement of ULBs. There is need to begin a larger debate on access modalities of climate funds from ULBs within Indian National Climate Fund Governance schemes.

Urban Local Bodies shall encourage the wards to list the climate change activities into their annual plans with financial and accounting mechanism of local act.

The outcomes of discussion at COP 23 on role of local governments in South Asian countries in climate action are: ♦♦ Local Governments in South Asia shall call upon cities to have South

Asian Cities Alliance on Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) as commitment to Paris Climate Agreement. ♦♦ Cities need to demonstrate collaborative approach on 2030 Agenda’s Sustainable Development Goal 11, which is to make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. Local Government in South Asia shall come out with country and region specific goals to achieve target and indicators. ♦♦ Cities shall participate in The City Resilience Program (CRP) which is an effort to assist city governments to build greater resilience to climate and disaster risks. CRP seeks to act as the banker of the cities, and to facilitate strategic investments that address the vulnerabilities and risks that cities face in a holistic way.

The way forward

The core domestic climate finance mechanism in India needs to strengthen the governance mechanism towards creating a more consolidated and devolved climate finance. The future climate finance governance mechanism will be more decentralized to encourage local action. Moreover, the need of local government with regard to climate adaptation and mitigation should be given a priority and a percentage of budgetary allocation shall be marked as climate finance budget.

The devolution of decision making based on 73rd and 74th constitutional amendment could be included as primary mechanism in direct access of climate finance. And, the role of ULBs shall be strengthened by continued awareness and capacity building to be included to identify climate risks and implementing solutions to make cities safe and resilient.

Provision of allocation of financial resources to municipal administrations for climate resilience; the budget could be monitored and reviewed for effectiveness under larger architecture of Monitoring Reporting and Verification framework.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

37

Article | Air Pollution

Breathing

to death Air pollution causes thirty percent premature deaths in India. The situation is getiing worse by the day. While people are choking to death, in place of an urgent solution what we get is blame game

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Kumar Dhananjay Consulting Editor

38 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

t was a monumental international shame when during the third test match between India and SriLanka, two Sri Lankan bowlers left the field.

They experienced breathing problem due to poor air quality. The game was stopped twice and at one point of time, the visitors didn’t have enough fit players to even field. It probably happened for the first time in the history of a sporting event. But the situation is not new for people who live in Delhi. Every day they are breathing themselves to death.

Air pollution causes thirty percent premature deaths

A report by the Centre for Science and Environment says that air pollution causes thirty percent of premature deaths in the country. The CSE report “body burden: lifestyle diseases” estimated that India had more than twenty-two crores of chronic COPD patients and around thirty-five million asthma patients. The report also says that increase in PM 2.5 in the environment can also cause Alzheimer’s. The situation is getting worse by the day but the response is equally poor. Multiple agencies, the

state government and the centre are at loggerheads trying to find fault with each other for the mess that the citizens of Delhi are in given the low-quality air.

Right to clean air

Every time one breathes in the national capital region, a thick cloud of smog goes in. India today is the global hotspot of air pollution and the national capital region is leading the pack. Data suggests that in India one in four premature deaths is caused by pollution. On an average, a citizen in Delhi is inhaling fifty cigarettes in a day due to pollution. The human cost of air and water pollution is immense.

Dipender Hooda, Congress MP, is planning to introduce a private member bill in the winter session of parliament.

He says’the pollution has killed more people in India than war, violence, smoking, hunger, natural disasters, AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria put together’. Right to clean air must be a fundamental right of every citizen. But in the national capital region, the issue of pollution has become a football game in which every agency and government is putting the blame on each other for the mess.

The great blame game

Things have steadily gone worst from bad. It’s pretty clear that the present legal and administrative mechanism has failed to address the problem.

Most of the times its the judiciary and executive that resorts to ad hoc measures when the situation reaches boiling point. The ban on the sale of firecrackers or occasional odd even formula are ad hoc measures but a comprehensive plan to fight the menace is nowhere in sight. What we witness on a daily basis is a blame game between various state governments and agencies entrusted with the task to address the issue. Citing lack of jurisdiction our elected representatives blame each other. The Delhi Chief Minister blames neighbouring states of Haryana and Punjab for the situation in the capital. BJP blames AamAadmi party, someone blames Congress and the in the midst of these blame games

the citizens suffers the most. A fresh approach is required and the first step should be to stop the blame game. The Twitter war between chief ministers must stop. The time has come that all those in the highest echelons of our democratic set up to join the ranks rising above politics to address the critical issue of air pollution. What is required is a joint working group that includes central government and the state governments with a clear mandate to propose and implement long-term solutions to address the hazardous levels of air pollution.

Success stories

We need to learn from success stories of the cities who tirelessly worked to get the air clean. Mexico City in 1992 was declared the most polluted city in the world by United Nations. But after years of work they have managed to bring down the air pollution level. The air quality index in the city now hovers in the 50-100 range. London had faced a similar crisis in the 1950s known as ‘great smog’. It led to a massive loss of lives forcing the British government to bring Clean Air Act in 1956 to turn things around. Beijing is another example where measures taken by the government have changed the life of its citizens. As the adage goes ‘where there is a will there is a way’. Do we have the will to fight the demon called pollution?

Steps in the right direction but implementation is a big question

A decision taken by the Petroleum Ministry to advance the introduction of BS-VI grade petrol and diesel in Delhi by two years to April 2018 to fight air pollution is a welcome and logical step.

But the question is of implementation and doubts have emerged over its impracticalities. Sceptics say that this is a knee-jerk reaction and the government is just shifting the goal posts. The reason is that the proposed plan leapfrogs the stage of BS-V completely and directly switches to BS-VI. It took seven years for the entire country to switch to BS-IV. Are the

oil companies equipped technically to deliver? The earlier plan was to introduce BS-VI in 2020. The other question is that if present automobile engines are not equipped to use the BS-VI grade fuel then the exercise would be ineffective. The step would fructify only if it is done in tandem with the rollout of BS-VI compliant vehicles. How is the government going to achieve this? We are still waiting to hear from them. Bharat Stage(BS) is a norm instituted by the government of India to regulate the vehicular air pollutants. The upgradation to BS-VI is likely to cost around forty thousand crores. Though it sounds a huge cost but is still not so big given the challenge at hand. The question is will automobile industry take the leap and make necessary changes to suit the new fuel in time.

Economics of clean air

To ensure the right to clean air for the citizens government has to act now.

While vehicular pollution is one aspect of the problem, burning of crop residue in agricultural belt of Haryana and Punjab must be addressed urgently.

New technology and machines must be provided to the farmers of these states so that they stop burning stubbles. One study suggests that a machine called ‘happy seeder’ can do away with the problem of crop burning. Even the cost is very low and it would be a fraction of forty thousand crore budget of agricultural ministry.

Prevention is better than cure. What we need today is both prevention and cure. The public outcry forces the government to act. What is required is that citizens must be vocal about demanding action on air pollution otherwise progress will continue to be slow. We need to create more platforms to address the issue and turn it into a movement. What is aptly clear is that blame game is not going to solve the problem. The economics of clean air will be a concerted effort of all stakeholders and the government and the executive have to join hands with the people to resolve the problem of pollution.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

39

Article | Urban Flora & Fauna

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SAVE THE

Sparrow in the cities

Fazalahmed B Khan | Advisor (Urban & Legal Services), AIILSG

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rbanization is on the roll the world over. More than half of the world’s population has come to stay in urban areas, which proportion is increasingglobally.

According to the Ministry of Urban Development, India is in the midst of transition from a predominantly rural to a quasi- urban society. Urbanization in India has become an important and irreversible process, and an important determinant of national economic growth and poverty reduction. The Census 2011 has recorded the urban population of India at 377 million (31.2%). There are many projections as to the progress of urbanization in India and the world. Primacy of urbanization is the buzz and there is no denying the fact of paradigm shift urbanization has brought about in terms of growth of economy, industry structure, employment, rapid modes of transportation, education, health, amenities of comfortable living and working, cultural and social activities, etc. etc. As development of the infrastructure and housing among other things is not keeping pace with the rate of urbanization, the ill-effects of this mismatch is now engaging the attention. Pollution is also a major issue severely affecting the quality of life in urban areas. In addition to these issues, there are some issues that are not engaging the attention and causing irreversible changes of losing. These issues relate to how cities are losing on natural bounties.

40 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Nature’s creation is bountiful. As a part of the scheme of things of nature, certain animals and birds are made to live with humans. That makes the life beautiful. A city is a human settlement and among the birds that give company to city dwellers are crows, rock-pigeons, sparrows, mynas, etc. Earlier the list of such birds was long but over the decades, as a result of concretization of the city, loss of traditional houses and uncaring attitude of city dwellers, the list has sharply narrowed down.

The birds that have survived are those that have adapted themselves to the changing conditions. Crows are nature’s scavengers and perform many functions in the environment which go unappreciated. They are called birds of opportunity- symbolically they teach us that no opportunity should be missed.

They are examples of how to survive when no one cares for them. The grey coloured rock-pigeons have all along given company to humans. The persons/ communities with compassionate bent of mind feed them grains on which the pigeons survive and multiply in cities.

This is a bright example on the part of such persons/communities of giving without expecting anything in return.

Cute Sparrow

The next bird in our list is sparrow (Passer domesticus) small, cute, innocent, chirping bird. Sparrows build their nests wherever they canon window sills, the tops of doors, and almirahs, and in the nooks and corners. The onslaught of urbanization,

concretization of cities, loss of informal settings in residences and localities is causing loss of habitat to them and thus, big decline in their population and presence in cities. This has been noticed by some discerning nature and bird lovers. Fortunately, there are some environment conscious individuals and institutions that have paid attention to this problem. The Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) conducted a study across the country, which reported absence of sparrows from about 50% areas during 2005-2012, compared to that in pre-2005. While 1-30 birds were spotted frequently, clusters of 30 plus saw a 60% decline.

While nests could be often seen before 2005, they fell by 65% in the last decade. Going through the media coverage one finds that dwindling number of sparrows is a mystery in Britain, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Italy. This decline is well documented in the U.K. Mr. Mohammed Dilawar, who founded the Nature Forever Society, has taken remarkable initiatives towards arresting the decline in populations of sparrows through various forums and activities. According to the NFS,sparrows are not able to adapt to the changes in the urban landscape, and therefore die out for want of space to build their nests. Another society by the name The Plant and Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) through surveys found that various changes in cities in the last few years, like tree cuttings and dwindling of old grocery stores have not left room for sparrows to build nests or nibble on grains and other

food items that were earlier accessible in small retail shops.

Late Syedna Burhanuddin, head of the Bohra community was concerned with this issue and caused distribution of more than 50,000 bird feeders. Bird feeders are cylinder shaped objects in which small grains like broken rice are filled. There is a small bowl shaped outlet at the bottom. Sparrow eats from the bowl and small quantities of grain trickle in the bowl.

Celebrating World Sparrow Day is an innovative idea initiated by the Nature Forever Society in collaboration with other national and international organizations. It is celebrated on 20 March every year since the year 2010.

As the idea has attracted attention of various nature loving and bird loving individuals and institutions, every year heartening reports are coming out from various parts of the country. The Forest Department of Government of Maharashtra initiated a pilot project on the issue of ‘vanishing birds’. Among other things they placed about 1000 artificial nests at various locations for sparrows and found 80 per cent occupancy. Encouraged by the positive results they have continued the project for 2017 and 2018 and extended it to Thane, Kalyan, Alibag, Mahad, Shriwardhan while in 2018, they will be kept at Vasai, Shahpur, Goregaon, Ulhasnagar, Ambarnath.

In Hyderabad, one bird lover Rajani Vakkalanka founded Citizens’ Action for Local Biodiversity Awareness and Conservation (CALBAC).

Supported by few like-minded individuals, she has been engaged in spreading awareness on sparrows as well as setting up nesting facilities in different areas. They have got boxes prepared by carpenters at a cost of Rs 45 to Rs 50 and provide them at the same cost. According to her, sparrows are disappearing because of three main reasons: lack of space for nesting, absence of shrubs and non-availability of worms for baby sparrows. Baby sparrows survive on worms fed to them by mother sparrows. Sparrows pick up worms from shrubs, grassy patches, etc.

Delhi has declared sparrow as State Bird in 2012 as a part of the campaign to save the species. A media report from Varanasi showed that Varanasi Forest Division undertook an awareness drive by sensitizing school children and distributing wooden nests and holding Talk shows. In Lucknow individuals, NGOs, schools or colleges that have done notable work towards conservation of the species of common birds were awarded.

In Mumbai BNHS, NFS, Mahim Nature Park, etc. are hubs of nature lovers and bird watchers. Media coverage of these events shows that there are individuals and institutions

that are working for the cause of arresting population decline of sparrows in Mumbai with dedication.

A Dharavi resident Mr. Pramod Mane runs a Sparrow’s Shelter and has installed thousands of sparrow nests across Mumbai. In fact list of such individuals and organizations is increasing. May their ilk multiply!

Constitutional mandate and needed actions by municipal bodies

A city is a human settlement and a settlement should not lose out on nature’s beauties but maintain them for the next generations.The Constitution of India has rightly included in the mandatory functions the item of “urban forestry, protection of environment and promotion of ecological aspects” for the municipalities, in the 12th Schedule. Protection of the flora and fauna, creating conditions conducive for them to survive and flourish in the cities squarely fits into the four corners of the constitutional mandate for a municipal corporation. Municipal bodies are performing multifarious roles and are executing a large number of projects, works, big and small. It is fitting that as furtherance of their mandate of promotion of ecological aspects, the Municipal Corporations and Municipal Councils take it in their agenda to save this cute tiny bird, so that it’s hopping and chirping around us remains with us. Concern for cities is their prime role and they must support and encourage citizens and institutions that are working for saving an object of beauty in the city. Such an initiative fits in their mandatory duties. Some Municipal Corporations are known to have taken some initiatives like installing artificial nests in their parks.

They can devise various measures on a higher scale on the lines of innovative initiatives of NFS, BNHs and other individuals and institutions. With their resources, organized departments,and their outreach in the city, they can make a big impact to these activities and also involve the public, school and college students, corporate bodies and NGOs and support the cause.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

41

VELO-CITY | Mysuru

The Cultural Capital of

Karnataka Mysuru is aptly called cultural capital of Karnataka. The Dussehra festivities attract tourists fron not only India but from across the globe. Life is a leisure in the city and it’s called pensioner’s paradise. The sheer beauty of the town, its culture, history and heritage structures mesmerise you.

It’s a life time experience to visit the city and enjoy its calmness, beauty and vitality Kumar Dhananjay | Consulting Editor

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ysore, officially renamed as Mysuru in 2005, is known as the cultural capital of Karnataka. It is well known for the festivities that take place during Dussehra. The grandeur and scale of this festival in Mysuru are unimaginable. You’ve got to see it to believe it. The festival is celebrated across India but in Mysuru it has a significance that is unmatched. The celebration was first started by the King

42 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

Wadiyar I in 1610. The last two day celebration of the festival is a life time experience to watch.

Mahanavmi and Vijayadashmi, that is ninth and tenth days of the festival are most important. On the ninth day the royal sword is worshipped and is taken in a procession of wonderfully decorated elephants, camels and horses. On the tenth day that is Vijayadashmi a huge procession is taken out which is locally known as ‘Jumboo Savari’. The procession starts from the historical Mysuru palace.

The idol of goddess Chamundeshwari, placed on a golden mandap on the back of an elephant is accompanied by dancing troops, music bands and a sea of humanity. It culminates at a place called Bannimantapa where a tree is worshipped and a torchlight procession locally known as ‘Panjina Kavayatthu’ is taken out. There is great history and several reasons why Mysuru is called the cultural capital of Karnataka today.

The legend associated with the name Mysuru

The name itself is an anglicized version of ‘Mahishuru’. In Kannada it means the place where Mahisha lived.

Mahishasura, as we all know, is a mythical demon who could assume both forms, that of a human and a buffalo. As per mythology he ruled the ancient parts of Mysore Kingdom. In Sanskrit the place is known as Mahishaka which is centred at Mahishapura. The legend is that he was killed by goddess Chamundeshwari whose temple is still situated at the top of Chamundi hills. From Mahishapura it later became Mahishuru. The Royal

family of Mysuru still uses this name for the place. Later during the British period it was named Mysore. And more recently the Karnataka government changed the name again and it is now known as Mysuru.

lost its status as administrative capital in 1831 when the British commissioner moved the capital to Bengaluru but regained it in 1881. It remained the capital till India became independent in 1947.

Revisiting History

The city

Mysuru served as capital city of the Kingdom of Mysore for nearly six centuries from 1399 to 1956. The Kingdom was ruled by Wadiyar dynasty.

Their rule was disrupted by Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan in the eighteenth century. But the Wadiyars were patrons of art and culture and promoted it significantly in the state. That was the reason the city earned the sobriquet of cultural capital of Karnataka. Mysuru palace, where it stands now, was once occupied by a village named Puragere.

The Mahishuru Fort was constructed in 1524 by Chamaraja Wadiyar III. It took almost a century for the Kingdom to become a sovereign ‘state’. In the 17th century Wadiyars expanded their territory and annexed large parts of the region that is now known as southern Karnataka and parts of Tamilnadu to become a powerful state in southern Deccan. In the latter half of the 18th century the Kingdom reached the height of its military power under the aegis of the ruler Hyder Ali and his son Tipu Sultan. During this period, the Kingdom came into conflict with Marathas, the British and the Nizam of Golconda.

It led to four wars. After Tipu Sultan’s death in fourth Anglo-Mysore war, the British distributed the Kingdom to their allies. The former Wadiyar rulers were reinstated as puppet monarchs.Mysuru

Mysuru as it is known today is the third most populous city of Karnataka located in the foothills of Chamundi hills. The city has a population of about nine lakh and is spread over an area of about hundred and thirty square kilometres. The city is known for its heritage structures including the majestic Mysuru palace. The Wadiyars promoted art and culture in the city and state during their time and patronized it. It’s the cultural environment that earned the city sobriquet ‘cultural capital of Karnataka’. It receives a huge number of tourists from not only India but across the globe during Dussehra festivities. From cultural activities to unique art forms and even some products are famous as the city lends its name to them. While Mysore Dussehra and Mysore painting are famous for their rich cultural heritage, mouthwatering Mysore Pak and Mysore Dosaare known for their unique taste.

The city is not far behind in fashion as well. Mysore Peta and Mysore silk sarees are an instant hit with people since decades. Cosmetic brands such as Mysore Sandal Soap and Mysore Ink are quite popular across a cross-section of Indians.

Places to visit

Mysore has a quaint charm that appeals to you because of its rich cultural and historical heritage. Srirangapatna, the de facto capital of Mysore during the rule of Tipu Sultan and Haider Ali has many palaces, forts and mosques dating back to that era. There is a Tipu Sultan memorial once you enter the place carrying a plaque that says ‘The body of Tipu Sultan was found here’.

Built in 894, Ranganathaswamy temple is a sanctum of Lord Vishnu. It has undergone various renovations under successive rulers. But the summer palace of Tipu Sultan known as ‘Dariya

Daulat Bagh’ is the biggest attraction in Srirangapatna.

The palace symbolises Indo-Islamic architecture and was built of teak way back in the 18th century. The palace is set amidst well spruced lawns and is lined with flower beds. Inside the palace you see the rich oil paintings depicting the victory of Tipu Sultan and Haider Ali over the British. St. Philomena’s Church is one of the oldest in Mysuru.

It is more than two hundred years old.

It was a small church but later it was expanded by Wadiyar III. Once the city was conferred the honour of being the capital city, Christian population flocked to the city and hence it was expanded.

It’s undeniably a visual delight. Last but not the least, in the heart of the city is situated Mysuru palace. It is one of the most fascinating and imposing architectural creations. It’s a perfect blend of Hindu and Islamic architecture.

The exterior of the palace resembles Islamic architecture; the interior is a reflection of Hindu architectural norms.

Not to be missed is the famous Chamundeshwari temple at the top of Chamundi hills. Situated at a height of three thousand feet, one needs to climb thousands of steps to reach there. Designed in Dravidian fashion the shrine is an attractive structure with seven storied tall tower adorned with beautiful engravings. Brindavan garden located at a distance of twenty kilometres from Mysuru is a place one must pay a visit to. The lawn and illuminated dancing fountains have enhanced the beauty of the garden.

It is not surprising that the garden has provided a backdrop for many Indian movies.

Life at leisure

Aptly called ‘pensioner’s paradise’, life in Mysuru is slow and enjoyable both for those who live there and for tourists who frequent the city. The calmness of the city echoes through your mind. It’s an ideal destination if you love history and want to experience some regal splendour. A splash of nature, a lot of history and a sea of cultures are what make Mysuru what it is and it shall remain so.

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

43

BOOK REVIEW | GOOD READS

Conflicts of interest Abhilash Khandekar | Sr Journalist

“I

n 2013 when I was cycling, a car reversed, hit me and sped awayleaving me bleeding on the road. This is what happens again and again in every city of our country, on every road, as we plan without care for the safety of pedestrians and cyclists, who are as good as ‘invisible users’. They die doing nothing more than the most ordinary things like crossing a road “.....this is what Sunita Narain writes at one place in her latest book enumerating her 35-year long environment activism.

Sunita needs no introduction, so do her writings and what she publicly stands for. Barring in bits and pieces where she tells us new stories or views on the ‘green fight’ she has been engaged in for others, the book does not offer much fresh stuff.

Yet, it is readable. Why? Because at one place you get to know the recent history, events, perspectives, arguments, and some political insight into the glaring environmental issues India has been facing-from water to tiger!

As country’s leading and committed environmentalist, she has her firm opinions about everything environmental-climate change, pollution, urban planning, wildlife and the dirty politics around it. Given her engagement with the vast and complex sector for over 35 years, Sunita is widely read about and seriously heard when she speaks. The crusader in her does not stop from airing her well considered views, mostly based on scientific evidences.

And what she consistently says is about the common good, of this ancient

44 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

country’s millions of poor and middle class people. She repeatedly says air pollution is an equaliser!

Why I started the review of her book here with her own experience on the New Delhi roads is because what she has narrated in that particular chapter relating to air pollution, is being faced by most Indians daily but they have no voice. Travelling on Indian roads is a very risky affair, something the Union Minister Nitin Gadkari has started saying from day one. And he is serious about it and taking steps to curb road deaths. Sunita says “We cannot lose the space to walk and cycle....we have built the city’s roads only for cars. They rule the road. There are no dedicated lanes for cycles; there are no sidewalks. The little stretches that do exist are either dirty or taken over by parked cars. Roads are for cars. The rest don’t matter. “The readers of Urban Update would easily connect with what she is saying.

She goes on...”but cycling and walking are difficult not just because of poor planning. It is also because of our mindset that only those who move in a car have road rights. Anyone who walks or cycles is poor, wretched and destined to be marginalised,if not obliterated”.

This is a small book with just seven chapters but the selection has been very precise. They tell us stories about cola wars her Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) fought bitterly against all odds, as also about the debates on tiger conservation-with or without people. A substantive part is dedicated to air pollution, one of her pet themes on which despite her and CSE’s long drawn fight against government, (unfortunately) pollution is consistently on the rise. Even the Supreme Court appointed Environment Pollution Control Authority (EPCA) of which first Anil Agarwal and after him, she is a member are seen to have failed. Former bureaucrat Bhure Lal is chairman of this committee since it was first formed.

When I was writing this piece,

pollution in December first week of 2017 was very very high in the national capital where former US president Barack Obama perhaps spent two days inhaling toxic air, and so did the Sri Lankan cricketers, playing a five-day Test match at Kotla stadium. On all days pollution levels were severe but money minded BCCI never thought of suspending the game.

Sunita is a prolific writer; besides editing her Down to Earth magazine, she produces many research documents on a variety of topics from municipal waste to water and forests to food safety.

Her book has hit the stands when the pollution levels have been all time high in the past several decades, mainly due to automobiles and construction material dust. She drops broad hints in her book that her next fight is going to be against clean diesel car technology because without that Delhi will not get clean air. The carcinogenicity index of diesel is not a laughing matter. It will poison. It will kill-this is no longer ‘slow murder’, but ‘fast and deliberate murder’ the book tells us. Incidentally, it was

CSE which had first published a book Slow Murder (released by the then Vice President KR Narayanan at his official residence) way back in 1996 setting the problem out in details. It’s 20 years now but pollution is rising and rising and that makes Sunita’s resolve firmer and firmer.

She says explosion in the number of cars with no standards set for quality of fuel and vehicle emissions have made the Delhi air toxic.

Last year in November around Diwali, Delhi’s air turned so black that even the most sceptical became breathless. It was literally ‘death by breath’....There was no question that Delhi faced a public health emergency because of its deteriorating air quality. Giving account of earlier years Sunita wonders “why had the air in Delhi become so bad and what could be done to combat this hazardous pollution?” And then systematically explains it too.

In a way what the author suggests in her book obliquely is that the slow murder of hundreds of people of the national capital has been happening since last 20 years when CSE started its work on air pollution in 1996 and first raised alarm over vehicular emissions.

Curiously enough, the book tells us that the Supreme Court’s original case directing the Government of

Book Conflicts of Interest-My journey through India’s Green Movement Author Sunita Narain Publisher Penguin Random House Pages 228 Price Rs 599/Rating B (Read from a library)

Good

Reads

Delhi to ‘clean up the air’ continues to date (writ petition number 13029 of 1985-MC Mehta versus Union of India and others). Imagine how courts and the governments function in public interest-20 long years and no solution yet in sight with people losing lives due to inaction of the authorities!

Her fight was not only limited to Delhi or NCR. Padre is a village in Kerala where aerial spraying of endosulfan devastated entire village where a medical practitioner Dr YS Mohana Kumar was slapped with legal notices for finding out the problem and treating poor, ignorant patients. CSE, led then by Anil Agarwal, the founder, too investigated the case and fought till the end but was intimidated no end. It was AK Antony, then chief minister of Kerala who banned the spraying and later Union health minister CP Thakur supported the ban saying it caused cancer to villagers.

What the author has said in her lengthy stories that the new generation must know, is that from time to time, CSE and her teams scientifically proved and investigated such scams against people and nature but vested interests and lobbies used their economic might to defame herself and her team. As you keep turning pages after pages, every time you realise that she continued taking on the high and mighty only to help a large section of the society which had no clue what was being done to them and to their lives in the name of selling pesticides or Coca Cola. Her fierce fight against the two powerful soft drink giants of the US is no less interesting.

How the CSE laboratory findings were challenged; how they were berated; the statement of health minister Sushma Swaraj in the Parliament after Government’s food testing labs at Mysore and Kolkatta had tested the samples and almost denied the CSE findings; the formation of a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) under SharadPawar’s chairmanship in 2003 and finally the victory of Sunita and her team as the JPC ruled in their favour on the eve of Lok Sabha polls of 2004, allaying fears that politicians may favour global soft drinks companies and their big money etc, is written in a very matter-of-fact manner.

It reminds us how someone other than the government has to be vigilant for the public good. Because the government, in this particular case-which actually started from the testing of bottled drinking water-never ever thought of testing the colas made of American and European formulas and the water they used, notwithstanding the fact that Prevention of Food Adulteration Act 1954 was in place, people were drinking pesticides. It was government’s job which CSE did.

Her rich experiences of climate change conferences, the deals struck on international fora, the convoluted international politics associated with itall have found their way into this book.

I was particularly curious about her experiences as the Tiger Task Force chairperson which she has interestingly put together. If in pesticides war the moneyed manufacturers were against her, in cola war global lobbies were lampooning Sunita. But strangely, when she was nominated by PM Dr Manmohan Singh as the tiger working group’s head, post Sariska debacle, none other than the wildlife conservationists bayed for her blood, almost!

They asked who she was. She has never seen a tiger and so on. Yet, she went about doing her business and submitted the ‘Joining the Dots’ report in August 2005 as a result of which the Project Tiger was bundled and an authority-NTCA-was created for better governance besides improving the science of counting the Tigers. The pug marks method was discontinued and camera trap method introduced in 2006.

As far as Delhi is concerned she says only 10-15 per cent of Delhi owns or drives cars but these vehicles take up 90 per cent of the road space and contribute to the bulk of the contaminants in the air.

And therefore she one again argues for public transport and mobility revolution, something like Singapore has done.

(The writer is a veteran journalist and writes about politics, environment and urban affairs. He can be contacted at kabhilash59@gmail.com and twitter @abhikhandekar1)

www.urbanupdate.in | December 2017

45

URBAN AGENDA | Urban Resilience

Future proofing of cities

I

ndia is creating new cities and it is imperative for policy makers and politicians at the helm of affairs to shift their focus to lowcarbon development for future proofing our cities from potential hazards emanating from intense urban growth.

How the scale of such growth in cities is managed in the coming future will have significant impact of economic health of the country. All the agendas related to address abject poverty, improving living standards and moreover, liveability in urban centres will also depend on it.

In one its reports, the World Bank stated that “Cities by their nature, and often by design, are however fragile and vulnerable to the vagaries of disasters and major disruptions. We should anticipate that disasters will strengthen and increase in frequency this century.”

Atkins Global and All India Institute of Local Self-Government (AIILSG) has jointly published a handbook titled ‘Planning and Design Handbook for Integrated City Development: A holistic approach to a low carbon and resource efficient future’ in 2013. The researchers have analysed why carbon footprints of cities have gone up drastically in India.

The report has underlined the sector where the government could not deliver and the alternatives explored the citizens resulted in higher emission. It explains how lack of uninterrupted power supply in many cities of India, people chose dieselrun power generators. Lack of efficient transport system made people buy cars.

After corporations failed to provide adequate water supply in cities, people installed submersible pumps and this in turn had negative impact on water levels.

This is true for many cities and towns in many parts of the country even today.

The sprawl model of urban development resulted in more carbon emission. Our

46 December 2017 | www.urbanupdate.in

cities have begun to face the heat but yet reducing carbon does not feature in the priority list of our cities. Only a couple of our cities can boast of efficient public transport system. Transit Orient Development that has been a natural development phenomenon in our cities has been neglected over the years and many cities adopted zoning style of expansion. The trend is reversed now.

Transit Oriented Development (TOD) can help in reducing number of motorised trips and can give a boost to nonmotorised transport. This reduces the number and length of trips and enables mode shift towards modes which have a lower energy and carbon impact. Global cities are also going for compact urban forms to make civic services efficient and also bring down per capita infrastructure and service delivery cost.

In addition, public transport networks using low carbon emitting vehicles and non-motorised modes can help in reducing carbon emission. The cities can also come up with idea of declaring congested business areas as Non-Motorised Zones.

This is a challenging task and cannot be done without taking locals in confidence and making them aware of its long-term benefits. The failure of such plan in Connaught Place because of protests of businessmen last year is a lesson.

Apart from this, low-carbon development approach should also include provision of building new extensive green infrastructure in cities to neutralize carbon emission. There are major opportunities to improve the efficiency of buildings, energy and waste through the low carbon planning approach. By looking at these together, the climate change risk and vulnerability of the city can be reduced significantly and make them future-proof from climate change induced risks.

Ashok Wankhade Managing Editor bhau1008@gmail.com

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